Talk

Yesterday's post about the etymology of "walk" made me wonder about "talk." Seems reasonable to think this rhyming pair might have something in common historically.

Nope. Here's etymonline.com again:

c. 1200, talken, probably a diminutive or frequentative form related to Middle English tale "story," and ultimately from the same source as tale, with rare English formative -k (compare hark from hear, stalk from steal, smirk from smile) and replacing that word as a verb. 

Well, talk being related to tale makes a lot more sense to my modern ear than walk being related to fulling.

But stalk comes from steal! How cool is that? And smirk directly from smile.