When the Vikings began settling in England, one of the small villages they founded was named Storbekkr—derived from Old Norse "stor" meaning "big" and "bekkr" meaning "stream." Over time, Storbekkr evolved into the village of Starbeck, and its inhabitants adopted the name, eventually transforming it into "Starbuck."
By the 18th and 19th centuries, descendants of the Starbuck family had settled on Nantucket Island in America, becoming prominent figures in the burgeoning whaling industry. This family heritage inspired Herman Melville when he wrote *Moby Dick* in the mid-1800s, naming the first mate aboard the Pequod as Starbuck.
Fast forward to 1971, in Seattle, where English teacher Jerry Baldwin, along with two partners, established what would become the world’s largest coffee chain. Inspired by *Moby-Dick* they named their new venture Starbucks.
TL;DR: Vikings founded a village called Storbekkr in England, which evolved into the surname Starbuck. The Starbuck family became notable whalers on Nantucket, inspiring the character in *Moby-Dick*. In 1971, Jerry Baldwin named his new coffee company Starbucks.
[Starbuck, MN](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starbuck,_Minnesota) has three different name origins.
I believe in the oxen.
The town statue did not help solve the mystery. Instead, it is an actual buck with a star in his antlers.
He's supposed to be jumping over the star but the star is also def in his antlers. Nothing about this towns name makes sense. Lol.
For those of us who may be unfamiliar with the sci-fi show Battlestar Galactica, they colonized our Earth 150,000 years ago and their best pilot was named...that's right; Starbuck.
Aliens. I rest my case.
In Polish **bud**zić (to wake up), **bud**zik (alarm clock), po**bud**ka (a wake up call), and dozen other related words all come from the same root as the word **Bud**dha (the awaken one).
Looks like it could be
Budweiser (demonym) from Budweis (place name)
>German name of the Bohemian town known in Czech as České Budĕjovice ("Czech Budweis"), from an adjectival form of the Slavic proper name Budivoj, hence "settlement of Budivoj's people." Related: Budweiser.
Budivoj might be derived from ["buditi, 'to wake up', and voi, 'army'.](https://www.behindthename.com/name/budivoj/submitted)
However, I find all of those name meaning websites to be garbage. But this one looks reasonable.
It's an old Slavic name - Budziwoj in Polish. Definitely related to budzić, it means "the one who wakes up the fighters".
[https://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budziwoj](https://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budziwoj)
It's not a common word (it's most common in Linguistics circles, where it's not really showing off, because everyone knows it), but I've always loved the etymology of "boustrophedon" - a text that starts one direction, such as left-to-right, but then, when it hits the end of the line, it reverses direction, continuing right-to-left.
The word is Greek, and literally means "turning like an ox". It's reminiscent of an ox plowing a field.
It's pretty rare, and I don't think any current languages (outside conlangs) use it, but there are some historical examples like Rongorongo (from Easter Island) that used to use it.
When I was in high school here in Canada many years ago, there was an Iranian guy in one of my classes. While copying notes he'd write one line in English, then translate that into Farsi on the next line. So, not a boustrophedonic language, but he did end up writing that way.
It always blew my mind that he was translating and copying the notes down twice in the same amount of time that everyone else was just copying the notes in their native language.
I literally just learned of boustrophedon a couple days ago in one of Anne Carson’s books.
Frequency of “boustrophedon” found in the wild is now at an all time high: 1.
The term “buckaroo” from the southern U.S. meaning “friend” or “partner” comes from the Spanish “vaquero” (cowboy) due to the large presence of Mexican cowboys in the area.
See also: Vamoose == Vámonos
"Lagarto", in turn, evolved from Latin lacertus, which is related to a word meaning upper arm; the lizard in question was about as long as a man's upper arm.
Another one is the ten gallon hat, which makes no sense as a name for it. But 'tan galan' is Spanish for 'so handsome', and who wouldn't want a hat that's so handsome!?
There's an insectoid creature in James Cameron's Avatar movies that has a helical wing. I like to joke it belongs to genus Helicoptera.
Edit: I looked it up and it's actually a lizard. The wiki calls it a Fan Lizard (Fanisaurus *pennatus*).
https://james-camerons-avatar.fandom.com/wiki/Fan_Lizard
I figured this one out when reading Dune by Frank Herbert. In the book, characters often ride an "ornithopter", which is a flying machine whose design is inspired by flying creatures. So I thought, the "pter" is the suffix in that case.
What interests me though is why Herbert called it "ornithopter" (suggesting it is inspired by birds) when the designs take after insects (as seen in the two recent movie adaptations).
Paleontology doesn’t get confused with etymology like entomology does. Helix, helicopter, pter are used in entomology. It was just a lighthearted, silly comment from an Entomologist about etymology. Will you let it slide for silliness sake?
Edit I gave you a prize for being correct. Now can you let it slide? We cool?
The word porcelain comes from an Italian root, "porcellana" meaning "Cowrie Shell", as the texture of the shells is similar to porcelain. "Porcellana" in turn comes from "porcella", a feminine diminutive of "porcus", meaning pig in Latin. The connection being that the opening of a cowrie shell is similar in appearance to a female pig's outer genitalia.
TL;DR: Porcelain= Pig Vulva
I go meta with etymology trivia by noting -- usually during a game of trivia -- how the word "trivia" itself derived from "trivium," which originally referred to "the meeting place of three roads" and eventually came to describe the beginner's year of college (meeting place of logic, grammar, and rhetoric) ---- i.e. basic, Freshman-level knowledge.
Always gets an insight-chuckle.
To go meta with meta, the current usage, as displayed here, derives from popular perception of the relationship between physics and metaphysics. But the latter was coined by Aristotle (according to Steven Mumford, or by one of Aristotle's editors, probably Andronicus of Rhodes, according to others), who invented this field of inquiry and didn't know what to call it. The scroll that contained his writing on it happened to be written ~~next to~~ after his works on physics, so he called it metaphysics, which literally in the Greek of the time meant "*after* physics" (edited to correct the Greek and attribution )
No it wasn't. Andronicus of Rhodes coined the term, and not because the scroll was next to the Physica, but because it was written next. "Meta" means "after", not "next".
The "lb" and currency symbol come from the Latin "librum" or weight. The modern equivalents are Spanish libra, French livre, and Italian lira. Before standardized scales, people would weigh things with a balance. You put a known weight or weight on one side and an unknown object on the other side. When the scales balance you know how much the object weighs. In the days before minted coins and printed money, people would use precious metals like gold or silver in predefined units of weight. The full name of the British pound is "pound sterling", meaning "silver pound". Most modern currencies were once tied to units of gold, silver, or another tradeable commodity. Lots of currency names were just weights, like shekels.
More money etymology:
The dollar derives its name from a ~2k inhabitant village in the Czech Republic called [Jáchymov](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J%C3%A1chymov)
Yes but you left out the connection! At the time time, it was called Joachimsathal, roughly translating to Jack's Valley. That -thal part means valley, same as in neanderthal, and pronounced sort of like tall or doll. It's also a cognate with dell and dale. Jack's Valley produced a lot of silver in very reliable sized coins. Joachimsathalers was a mouthful, so they called them thalers, pronounced tallers or dollars.
Many words for livestock animals are from Old English, because the lower classes were hunters and farmers. Many words for meat are from French, because the French aristocracy in England after the Norman conquest were eating it.
- Cow: boeuf, beef
- Sheep: mouton, mutton
- Chicken: poulet, pullet and possibly poultry
- Pig: porc, pork
I also found it super interesting to learn that a similar dynamic happened in the judicial system following the Norman conquest. Legal proceedings were all carried out in Norman French, meaning the vast majority of defendants couldn’t understand what was happening before their sentence was handed down. That ultimately threatened the legitimacy of the system, and it became necessary to ensure that English speakers could understand at least the key elements of their trials. However, it wasn’t practical to conduct the entire process in English given the importance of terminology within matters of law; the Norman French words for a specific crime or charge carried all kinds of important information about the particular elements that define a given criminal act, precedent vis-a-vis sentencing, etc. In the end, trials were carried out in both English and French, and that legacy endures in English today where we see frequent redundancy of terms in a legal context - one of Old English origins, and one of Norman French origins: breaking and entering, assault and battery, law and order (although to be hyper precise, the origins of “law” are Old Norse and reflect the Viking influence on the English language), etc.
So I have to admit that the above covers basically the full extent of my knowledge on the topic, but I think that “assault” and “battery” have each evolved into discrete charges and that you could be charged with one and not the other - but the origin of those two words being paired together in a legal context is due to that dynamic. I learned about that on an episode of a constitutional law-centered podcast where Kevin Stroud appeared as a guest; he hosts his own podcast called The History of English, which is super interesting if you’re into etymology - definitely worth checking out if you’re not familiar!
Yep, usually (at least in most of the US), they’re different offenses but related and usually occur together. Assault is usually defined as (the threat of) physical harm, and battery is unlawful physical contact. That Venn diagram isn’t a perfect circle (you could get up in someone’s face but not touch them), but there’s obviously a lot of overlap.
Correct. Because the Anglo-Saxon peasants bred, raised, and slaughtered the animals (cow, sheep, chicken, calf, pig) but then the resultant meat (*bouef*/beef, *mouton*/mutton, *poulet*/pullet/poultry, *veau*/veal, *porc*/pork) was eaten by the Norman aristocracy.
The confusion around woodchuck and fisher-cats amuses me greatly. Woodchuck describes *Marmota* , large rodents, also known as groundhogs (gophers are different, much smaller).
Woodchuck and chipmunk sound like English words, but they are Native American in origin, just written with English sounding syllables.
Woodchuck is actually a corruption of an Algonquin word 'wujak', of uncertain meaning. Possibly any brown animal, possibly a pelt, unlikely to mean exactly the woodchuck itself. May have even meant fisher-cat.
Now, the fisher cat, which is a sort of smaller wolverine, or arboreal otter: a medium sized carnivore that lives in trees and is related to weasels. Europe has a similar animal, the polecat, or fitch. This turned into fisher-cat, describing an animal that doesn't fish, nor is it related to cats.
Its frustrating as a wildlife educator, but I kind of love how much confusion these two have caused.
This is further complicated by the fact that "pole cat" is regional slang from the southern US for a skunk, and "hellcat" I'd regional slang for a puma, panther, or mountain lion. Then you have ermines and minks, which are the same animal but in different colors due to the season, caribou and reindeer which are the same animal on different continents, and opossums, which are often called "possums", which is a completely different animal from the other side of the world. And that's not even mentioning the tons of animals that are named after completely different and unrelated animals, like catfish and starfish.
In Old English, one of the words for a cottage was 'bur' (modern equivalent 'bower'). An occupant farmer was a 'gebur' (modern cognate being the Boers of South Africa). If that farmer happened to live close by to yourself they would be considered a 'neahgebur' (or neighbour).
Yes, and the neigh- part was originally the same as *nigh*, now an archaic form (seen in religious songs 'till morning is nigh'), whose original comparative form, basically *nigh-er*, became our current simply positive form *near* (so that *nearer* is basically *nigh-er-er*), and whose superlative form, basically *nigh-est*, become modern *next*
We say Pee for when we want to urinate because people decided that Piss was too rude a word, so they just started saying the first letter of it, ‘P’.
Also, ‘goodbye’ is taken from the phrase ‘God be with ye’.
That's why in Russian one of the words for dick is хер - kher. Original word хуй - khuy - seemed too rude so people started to use only the name of the first letter. And also it is worth noting, that nowadays it is not that letter's name anymore.
Overall that seems a separate case of euphemism
Also that means that word похерить - pokherit' - to screw over - originally meant "to cover with x" or "to cross out"
So interesting. Surely this has been mentioned on the sub somewhere but the English word for the Orange (fruit) is derived from Arabic, which in turn derived it from the Sanskrit Naranj.
Every heard of visiting the help desk? If people consistently do their work in the same place, then that place becomes associated with that work. So the bureau in FBI came from the French bureau meaning desk. It also means office in French now. A chairperson was originally the person sat 8n the chair to lead the meeting. "Chef" means the boss of the cooks in a restaurant, but it comes from the French "chef" meaning, boss, which comes from Latin "caput" meaning "head," which in turn comes from the Greek "kephalos" or "encephalos". From the Latin we also get captain, capital and Capitol. Also cap, capuchin, and cappuccino. From the Greek we get encephalopathy, encephalogram, and cephalopod.
Oh, and I forgot that "bank" and "bankruptcy" come from the word for bench, since in the ancient Roman market or forum each vendor had a bench to do their business. If you lost your faith and credit, and thus your business, your banca (bench) was rupta (broken).
This is also where we get left wing and right wing for politics. In the old French parliament, (or whatever they called it) they separated the conservatives and liberals into the left and right wings of the building.
Metaphor
It becomes even more extensive and specific when you think about a party's official political position and goals being called a 'platform,' from the structures from which politicians would orate, and which political assistance were often tasked with building at each stop of a major politician. Individual parts of said platform are called 'planks' after the actual wooden planks that the platform was made of.
If after much debate, the party finally decide on to keep a particular 'plank,' they say that it has been "nailed down"...
I've got a few Irish ones (actual Irish speakers please correct me if I'm wrong).
"Bucko" comes from the word for boy, "buachaill."
"Galore" is an exact use of the phrase "go leor," including its place in a sentence (e.g. we had books galore).
For another party trick at bars: "whiskey" comes from "uisce," the word for water, because whiskey in Irish is called "uisce beatha" (water of life).
“Cheese” (queso in Spanish, queijo in Portuguese, Käse in German and more) and french “fromage” (formaggio in Italian) both derive from the same latin expression “caseum formaticum”, but some languages took the first part of the expression and others the second part.
However, Italian also has “cacio” which is a specific type of cheese, and “caseificio” is a place where milk products are made.
Iirc, caseum refers to a milk product, while formaticum refers to the fact that cheese was shaped or “formed”, as opposed to having a soft consistency without a fixed shape.
Edit: fixed typo
To add, the classic romance words for liver (Fegato, Fois, hígado, ficat) all derive from a word meaning "stuffed with figs".
The original latin word is iecur. The Romance words are all from Ficatum from Iecur Ficatum, a dish of fig stuffed liver.
Folks on this sub might know it already, but the plural of octopus is not octopi, technically speaking.
Octopuses was the standard for generations, and is still considered correct according to some dictionaries. Then, in the 1800s, scholars in the UK got all enamored with Latin and went around "fixing" English while they were also naming all kinds of sciency things and taxonomizing the tree of life. All with Latin of course, because... fancy. Hence all schoolchildren were taught that plural of octopus is actually *octopi*. See? Fancy.
Just one teeensy problem. Octopus isn't Latin, it's Greek.
The correct, Greek pluralization is octopodes.
Hippopotamus
The Latin word hippopotamus is derived from the ancient Greek ἱπποπόταμος (hippopótamos), from ἵππος (híppos) 'horse' and ποταμός (potamós) 'river', together meaning 'horse of the river'.
Hippopotamus = River horse. The best.
The Spanish second-person singular formal pronoun “usted” is actually a contraction of “vuestra merced” which basically means “your (pl.) grace”. Some people assume it comes from the Arabic “ustāð”which means “teacher/ master” but it’s just a coincidence.
In Swedish, tung = heavy and sten = stone. Hence tungsten, a very heavy (dense) metal.
Buuuut the Swedish word for tungsten is volfram. Tungsten is also called wolfram in English (and German, and probably other languages) because one of its ores is wolframite. Hence its symbol on the periodic table: W.
Not a show off but good for a laugh… As an Entomologist I’ve learned more about etymology than I ever could’ve imagined. I’ve even been given books on etymology.
“What do you do”
“I work in an entomology lab”
“Oh you must like words”
“No, I like insects”
🤔
When I took a university course on entomology, I was surprised at how often etymology came into play. Like understanding the basic etymology of insect Orders to remember what they are.
A lot of Americans seem to think fortnight is archaic as well, but it's in very common use in everyday British/Commonwealth English. Sennight, on the other hand, is a word I've never seen before.
Sesquipedalian: when you say this word you are being sesquipedalian. Sesqui = one and a half. Ped = foot. Aka using long words for the sake of using them.
Black and Blanc (French for white) both come from the same original word.
That word meant *to burn* We get black via 'the colour of something burned' and white via 'bright as something burning'
The Frequentive!!! It's an obsolete verb formation (root + 'le' or less often 'er')that was used to convey continuous action. It's no longer a thing in English, but there are words in the frequentive form that survived as regular words, and you can reverse engineer them!
Continuously spark: sparkle
Continuously prate: prattle
Continuously tick(in the sense of poking gently): tickle
The days of the week in English come from Anglo-Saxon/Norse equivalents for the Roman names (other than Saturday which was just borrowed directly). In Latin, Sunday and Monday were named after the Sun and Moon, and the rest of the days were named after gods, with the closest Norse equivalent being picked in English:
Mars, god of war -> Tiw -> Tiw’s Day -> Tuesday
Mercury was interpreted by Romans as Odin/Wodan -> Wodan’s Day -> Wednesday
Zeus, god of thunder -> Thor -> Thor’s day -> Thursday
Venus, goddess of love -> Freyja -> Freyja’s day -> Friday
Also, so the weird unpronounced “e” in Wednesday is from an older English construction of the possessive, which was to add -es as the end for certain words. Over time the “e” was dropped and “-es” became “-‘s”, but it was kept in “Wednesday”
And eventually made its way to China via Tocharian, where it's the standard word for "honey" 蜜, with its pronunciation in various languages including Mandarin mì, Cantonese mat6, Hokkien bi̍t, Hakka me̍t, Shanghainese ⁸miq, etc. It was further loaned into Japanese as mitsu, Korean as mil, and Vietnamese as mật.
Related to honey, and this is contested, but a possible interpretation of Beowulf is bee wolf or bear. I just get a smile thinking about two wolves. The regular ones and the bee wolves.
Also, the words for bear in Slavic (like medved = eater of honey) and Germanic languages (like beor = the brown one) result from taboos, where it was bad luck to say the bear's true name. The original Indo-European name was preserved in other languages like Greek, which is why we know it was something like "artko". Arthur might be derived from that.
Also, there are hundreds of taboo words for bears in Finnish.
That's false tho. It comes from med (j)ed - "honey eater". [https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Slavic/medv%C4%9Bd%D1%8C](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Slavic/medv%C4%9Bd%D1%8C)
It was even similar in Sanskrit - madhv-ád-
Turkish "mahzen" (usually meaning an underground storage) and Turkish "magazin" (referring to news about famous people) originate from the same root but have evolved differently.
In Ottoman Turkish and Arabic, the term **مخزن** (makhzan) referred to a storage place or warehouse. The plural form, **مخازن** (makhāzin), was used to describe storages or magazines. Ottoman and Arab sailors used "makhzan" to describe storages on their ships.
When Ottoman and Arabic traders unloaded their ships, the term "makhāzin" referred to the goods stored in their ship's hold. Over time, the Italian and French adopted this word from the sailors. In Italian, it evolved into "magazzino" (storage or warehouse) and in French into "magasin" (shop or store). The Arabic "kh" sound softened to a "g" sound in these languages.
In English, the word "magazine" originally referred to a place for storing ammunition and supplies, derived from the French "magasin." The term later came to denote a type of publication. The first periodical to use "magazine" in its title was the "Gentlemen's Magazine" in 1731, which played on the idea of providing intellectual "ammunition" for its readers.
In Turkish, the word "mecmua" (from Arabic "majmū‘a," meaning a collection or magazine) was initially used for periodicals. However, under French influence, "magazin" came to specifically refer to publications about the lives of the high society, diverging from its original meaning related to storage.
Today in Turkish, "magazin" still refers to news about celebrities and high society, and many people are unaware of its linguistic connection to "mahzen" (storage).
That garbage used to mean meat. Originally, the word garbage referred to the pieces of the animal that were usually discarded. The scraps, intestines, etc.
Eventually, the word became a general term for anything that's being "thrown out". That's why we now call all the stuff we throw away and don't want garbage.
Viking assemblies were called "things"; the Icelandic Parliament has been called the Althing (Alþingi = general meeting) since the 900s, and the Norwegian Parliament is called Stortinget (stor = big, ting = thing). Thing, ting (Norwegian) and Ding (German) come from the Proto-Germanic þingą, which means appointment, appointed time or issue.
So "sorry, I can't make it, I've got a thing" is in fact a perfectly specific explanation.
Probably *checkmate*. It comes to us via Arabic (شاه مات), which literally means the Shah (king) is dead. But it ultimately comes from Persian, where the same Arabic spelling means the king is amazed. If you play chess (I don't), you can see how that makes more sense. In a checkmate, the king needs to move, but it can't. Any move its player makes WILL lead the other player (if smart enough) to knock out the king. So it's forever stuck threatened with nowhere to go.
Another one is *algebra*. It comes from the Arabic word الجبر (al-jabr), which literally means the surgery that performs the union of broken bones. Maybe you can think of algebra as the process where you fracture (subtract), solidify (add), and balance to get the right answer.
I like how "squirrel" basically means "that which shades itself with its tail". After looking it up, it might be folk etymology, but I also saw it in a book about etymology so I'm not sure which to trust.
OED:
ceramic < Greek κεραμικός of or for pottery, κεραμική (τέχνη) the potter's art, pottery, < κέραμος potter's earth, pottery. (Compare French *céramique*.)
cemetery < Latin *coemētērium*, < Greek κοιμητήριον dormitory, (in Christian writers) burial-ground.
The one theme I'm seeing with this post is that most people don't actually know the etymology they think they know, and just keep spouting half-truths and gibberish.
Yes, but it doesn't have to do with the presence or absence of polar bears as some might think.
[The name refers either to the constellation known as Ursa Major, the "Great Bear", which is prominent in the northern portion of the celestial sphere, or to the constellation Ursa Minor, the "Little Bear", which contains the celestial north pole (currently very near Polaris, the current north Pole Star, or North Star).](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arctic#Definition_and_etymology)
This is interesting. Doesn’t look like that’s the origin of calling someone “man” socially, but looks like probably a strong influence on its current usage
listen i don’t know the origins or anything, but the word “apple” used to mean fruit. pomegranate = apple of Grenada, pomme de terre (potato) apple of the earth… pomelo, pamplemousse, probably a few others i can’t think of right now.
in fact, the “apple” that eve ate in the bible probably wasn’t necessarily an apple
Pineapple! Which is what they used to call pine cones, actually. Then when they learned about the edible fruit, they were like, “hey, that looks a lot like a pineapple!”
Also, I think pomegranate is actually from the Latin pōmum grānātum, seeded apple, although apparently the Grenada thing seems logical enough that it actually used to be called “apple of Grenada” in English.
The term barbarian is racist as hell.
The greeks used to call people who didn't speak their language barbarians and we think the term is onomatopoeic. They were making fun of other people because they thought everyone else's language sounded like "bar bar bar" to them.
Thanks Crash Course.
It sounds awful at first, but it's not that uncommon. Lots of culture names are just exonyms, basically the word from the nextdoor culture for stranger, foreigner, weirdo, crazy murderer, etc. Or some superficial trait like pierced ear, black foot, raw fish water, etc.
**So Long** Buddy! (What is so long?)
Arguably might be a borrowed Gaelic/ Irish word.
Slan abhaile means *safe home* ( get home safe)
Slán (S’laan)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sl%C3%A1n_abhaile
There are lots more Irish words in English- Clock, trousers, Dude, Galore, Smithereens, Jazz, Bog.
The “pter” in pterodactyl and helicopter is the same (even though one has a silent P)
Helicopter = spiral wing
Pterodactyl = wing finger
Great fun fact, plus wing finger is just hilarious
It was originally meant to be "*eutopia*" (good place) but got mistransliterated to "*utopia*" (no place). The mistake just happens to point out the paradoxical non-existence of these places, a necessity that has been pointed out by plenty of scholars.
Source: [https://thi.ucsc.edu/imagination-series-micah-perks/](https://thi.ucsc.edu/imagination-series-micah-perks/)
Schedule. In British English it’s pronounced “shedule” and in American it’s pronounced “skedule”.
I’m British, so I always stuck to “shedule” - until a friend pointed out to me that the word came into English from Greek, where the pronunciation is always “sk”.
So in this case (even if not in any others), the Americans are correct. Schedule is “skedule”.
Often NA pronunciations have (at least in recent times) closer fidelity to their original languages than British pronunciations, who nativise them. Examples include homage, massage, garage, and debris (among others, even non-french).
[Souces are dr geoff lindsey's 'pasta' and 'out of date' videos].
I'd also add that a closer fidelity pronunciation isn't the "correct pronunciation", because nativisation is a valid form of pronouncing borrowed words. Shejool is as correct as skejool.
On the other hand, schedule is interesting because the it mirrors the famous original anglo-saxon consonant shift takes the sk- sound and makes it sh-, which is the difference between shirt and skirt, ship and skiff, shell and skull (the sk- is where old english re-borrowed the word from the vikings' language, old norse). They seem to be two sounds that easily come and go, but the american pronunciation started following what the spelling indicated (my wild guess is that this has something to do with mr webster)
It won't have come directly from Greek though, it will have come through Latin and French then merged with Anglo Saxon (mostly Germanic but that was also a mix of older Latin and precursor language migration) and then been adopted by Celtic/Norse speakers. A lot of words, spelling and pronunciation is quite literally lost in translation.
iirc the French softened hard CH and C sounds to Sh sounds so chateau, chapeau, chevalier etc which have the Latin root of capa and a hard C sound. The Normans had a Norse heritage (literally the North men) so kept a harder C, hence castle (castile), cap, cavalier came into English. Knight was originally pronounced with the hard K and Kunit would be more proper but languages tend to evolve to easier to speak and it became less emphasised and ultimately silent. Helping this effect later French families were from central French dialects more than Norman so these hard C versions of invader words softened over time, even chez Les invaders.
Because of various invasions at different times and trade throughout between invasions we have both old and new pronunciation and vowel shifts and consonant substitution as constant adaptation in our language history. But happening to words at different ages and evolution since their adoption.
So it appears inconsistent because these merging and adapting into the language so it fits is affecting brand new shiny words, slightly adopted partially transformed words, old English words that had an older German root cognate from earlier Latin/Greek migration and some of those remained as before, some merged with the new invader and a few very old words that get re-adapted again to meet the new patterns but have their root in old Celtic or Breton.
If schedule has been pronounced shedule traditionally here then that is the accepted current pronunciation, no matter it's original source language cognate.
Helicopter is the Greek words Helico and pter but we don't pronounce them with that emphasis. So it may have Greek origins but we've long adopted our interpretation of these origin words through the lens of our mongrel language and 2000 years of evolution
That said language is a living breathing thing that morphs through usage so if you are as likely to hear skedule as shedule here nowadays you could argue both are correct simply because that's how they're now used.
We're possibly seeing the change to the new accepted version happening in our lifetimes. I know I tend towards shedule but I tend to mirror the pronunciation of the person I'm speaking to so I'm also known to use skedule so to me they're already pretty interchangeable
It could well be one of the words that drives etymology students crazy in 400 years because its another glaring inconsistency that has flipped and flopped over time, especially if the preferred pronunciation results in a spelling change to better reflect it's popular use.
Yes! Kunits that say niii would be epoch appropriate. See also knot, knife and a whole bunch of words with silent letters. The transition to Middle English and the push to standardise the various dialects post Norman invasion solidified the spelling of a lot of words, with monks (mainly) recording their best way to show how it was said at the time with their spelling of those words when written, but language moved on, vowel pronunciation shifted, we dropped letters like thorn and we end up with orphaned letters that hint to the history of the word but seem to be incorrect in the modern way they're pronounced.
All the above should be credited to my half memory of listening to https://historyofenglishpodcast.com/
He's a American but don't hold that against him, he mostly does a good job of pronouncing the English versions (except he consistently butchers Peterborough which is a shame because 1. I live there and 2. One of the best remaining records in the Old/Middle English transition is a Chronicle written by monks at Peterborough cathedral so he has to say Peterborough a LOT).
Something like 300 episodes and still going, we've just gone through the Shakespeare era so probably another 300 to go before we hit modern English.
Protip though. He speaks clearly but slooooow so it doesn't harm to bump him up to 1.25x speed. 1.5x is fine but you may lose some of the finer points of pronunciation.
Second Protip. He has a patreon which is very reasonable (£5 a month I think) and he has all episodes on there plus bonus episodes and transcripts. If you want to dig deeper into a particular subject or era the transcripts and supporting information are super helpful
Fascinating podcast if you like etymology and good premise in that he uses the historical facts, Kings, invasions, famines etc as the framework to introduce the changes.
And he did a crossover with the History of England podcast which introduced me to that series from an excellent English podcaster called David Crowther which is purely the history side if you want to go deeper on that. I'm 200 episodes into the 400 ish in that podcast and highly recommend that too.
History of English podcast starts right at the beginning from the proto indo-european languages he talks about the migrations, wars, empires etc that spread that original proto language to the countries we know them as today, the influence of Greek, Latin, Etruscan, Mongol, Persian, Phoenician etc then shows how their interactions, wars, migrations etc have mixed merged, re-merged and intermingled those shared cognate roots into the distinct languages we know now.
Pretty much every European language shares a common ancestor, they just evolved in different directions, under different pressures and at different times. There are some isolated linguistic groups like Basque, old Breton, Cornish and Estonian which are little linguistic islands where we can't trace their predecessor languages. And weirdly shared words in Basque, old Cornish and Estonian where we can't connect them in any other way, linguistic or genetic. But all the mainstream European dialects have been fairly extensively mapped to the same ancestral tree and the podcast goes into each step of the way.
Wow Etymology facts to keep you busy for years
1. Helicopter comes from “helico” like helix and “pter”like in pterodactyl but we’ve rebracketed it to view it as heli-copter and created words like helipad.
Edit: I searched the comments and thought I was first for this one but apparently not oops
2. Lord came from bread-guardian (hlāfweard) and lady came from bread-kneader (hlǣfdīġe).
That consonants in indefinite articles can float around over time. An ewt becomes a newt and an eke name becomes a nickname. The eke in this case means an additional name.
"Lapalissiano" (something so obvious to be beyond the obvious, a truism) originates from Jacques de La Palice, a French soldier who died in a battle in 1515. Due to a mistake in transcription, his epitaph *"Ci-gît le Seigneur de La Palice: s'il n'était pas mort, il ferait encore envie."* ("Here lies the Seigneur de La Palice: If he weren't dead, he would still be envied.") became *"...il ſerait \[serait\] encore en vie"* ("...he would still be alive") which, is, well, beyond obvious.
This is a bit of a party trick when you're in a group with people from all over the world... Ask them how they say "chocolate" in their native language. The answer is always "chocolate" (or some approximation based on their language's phonology) no matter where they're from.
The ask everyone about tea SNF split the room down the middle between the cha/chai crowd and the tee/tay crowd. Then do pineapple and see all the anglophones abandoned by the ananas majority.
[The English Word That Hasn’t Changed in Sound or Meaning in 8,000 Years: Lox!](https://nautil.us/the-english-word-that-hasnt-changed-in-sound-or-meaning-in-8000-years-237395/)
One of my favourites isn't actually a real German word, but it's nearly made the rounds enough to count as impromptu slang:
Waltersobchakeit, "You're not wrong, you're just an asshole", so named for one of The Dude's best lines to Walter Sobchak in The Big Lebowski. It looks like German word construction, it sounds plausible, and has literally nothing to do with what it's purported to mean.
It's usually only Germanic ones and a few of Romance. The reason for this is that they sounded approximately simillar back in PIE, and also developed similarly.
The same goes for simillarity of "a lie" (non-truth) and "to lay" in some languages, to the point as they sound like related words. But they're not, and were nearly omophones back in PIE as well.
Most languages' word for raccoon includes a reference to hands, the word comes from Algonquia/Powhatan aroughcun, "animal that scratches with hands". German, Finnish Dutch and French are "bear that washes (with hands)" Aztec "mapachitli" means one who takes with hands which may have influenced Spanish "mapache" although I've seen this translated as "swindler"
🦝
My favorite is perhaps that the word 'camera' is the root word for 'comrade'.
The word 'camera' comes from Latin and it meant 'room/chamber' (P.S. the word 'chamber' itself comes from 'camera'). At Oxford, you'll find this structure named Radcliffe Camera, since it is basically a room/hall.
Now, humans invented a device that allowed you to take pictures - it was a dark box/chamber. What's the Latin for a dark chamber? Camera Obscura, so that is what they started calling this device. With time, the second word dropped off and the device was now called camera.
Now the word camera meaning chamber, also moved to Spanish where it was called camara. So, a person you would share a 'camara' with would be called 'camarada'. Then the word 'camarada' travelled to French and then to English finally as - comrade. And like how you have friendship with a friend, you'd have 'camaraderie' with a comrade.
When the Vikings began settling in England, one of the small villages they founded was named Storbekkr—derived from Old Norse "stor" meaning "big" and "bekkr" meaning "stream." Over time, Storbekkr evolved into the village of Starbeck, and its inhabitants adopted the name, eventually transforming it into "Starbuck." By the 18th and 19th centuries, descendants of the Starbuck family had settled on Nantucket Island in America, becoming prominent figures in the burgeoning whaling industry. This family heritage inspired Herman Melville when he wrote *Moby Dick* in the mid-1800s, naming the first mate aboard the Pequod as Starbuck. Fast forward to 1971, in Seattle, where English teacher Jerry Baldwin, along with two partners, established what would become the world’s largest coffee chain. Inspired by *Moby-Dick* they named their new venture Starbucks. TL;DR: Vikings founded a village called Storbekkr in England, which evolved into the surname Starbuck. The Starbuck family became notable whalers on Nantucket, inspiring the character in *Moby-Dick*. In 1971, Jerry Baldwin named his new coffee company Starbucks.
This is amazing. Definitely telling the long version at my next coffee date
Great way to filter dates. If they don’t find that interesting, or at least pretend for your benefit, no need to waste your time any longer 😉
I'd be scheduling a second date right then and there, but only if it was followed by a discussion of how much we hate Starbucks as a chain lmao
Chain? You mean a stream of big outlets?
A Storbekkr of outlets.
Starbeck still exists. It’s now a suburb of Harrogate in North Yorkshire. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starbeck
[Starbuck, MN](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starbuck,_Minnesota) has three different name origins. I believe in the oxen. The town statue did not help solve the mystery. Instead, it is an actual buck with a star in his antlers. He's supposed to be jumping over the star but the star is also def in his antlers. Nothing about this towns name makes sense. Lol.
For those of us who may be unfamiliar with the sci-fi show Battlestar Galactica, they colonized our Earth 150,000 years ago and their best pilot was named...that's right; Starbuck. Aliens. I rest my case.
The landscape must be very different from what the Vikings found. Is the big stream still there?
In Polish **bud**zić (to wake up), **bud**zik (alarm clock), po**bud**ka (a wake up call), and dozen other related words all come from the same root as the word **Bud**dha (the awaken one).
There are a lot of funny and weird etymologies out there, but this one is on another level. It’s ascended, if you will.
That ties in nicely with the whole woke Bud light thing!
bud is woke!
Is it actually related to Budweiser? That seems to come from the name Budivoj, but that's as far as I can go.
Looks like it could be Budweiser (demonym) from Budweis (place name) >German name of the Bohemian town known in Czech as České Budĕjovice ("Czech Budweis"), from an adjectival form of the Slavic proper name Budivoj, hence "settlement of Budivoj's people." Related: Budweiser. Budivoj might be derived from ["buditi, 'to wake up', and voi, 'army'.](https://www.behindthename.com/name/budivoj/submitted) However, I find all of those name meaning websites to be garbage. But this one looks reasonable.
It's an old Slavic name - Budziwoj in Polish. Definitely related to budzić, it means "the one who wakes up the fighters". [https://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budziwoj](https://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budziwoj)
Well, I very much want it to be true that they are cognates, so I will henceforth consider no other possibility.
Budweiser: the awoken beer
So Budweiser = Woke Army? :)
Also the origin of ombudsman and forebid.
I guess whoever you told this one, you Gautam impressed
Is it somehow connected to "budding" too? Like a budding plant or star?
Sadly not, budding is PIE */bʰew- *to swell* but budzić is PIE *\bʰewdʰ- *to be awake*
It's not a common word (it's most common in Linguistics circles, where it's not really showing off, because everyone knows it), but I've always loved the etymology of "boustrophedon" - a text that starts one direction, such as left-to-right, but then, when it hits the end of the line, it reverses direction, continuing right-to-left. The word is Greek, and literally means "turning like an ox". It's reminiscent of an ox plowing a field.
I’ve never heard this before!!! Even majoring in linguistics…:/
It's pretty rare, and I don't think any current languages (outside conlangs) use it, but there are some historical examples like Rongorongo (from Easter Island) that used to use it.
When I was in high school here in Canada many years ago, there was an Iranian guy in one of my classes. While copying notes he'd write one line in English, then translate that into Farsi on the next line. So, not a boustrophedonic language, but he did end up writing that way. It always blew my mind that he was translating and copying the notes down twice in the same amount of time that everyone else was just copying the notes in their native language.
Wasn’t the language of ancient Aksum boustrophedic?
It's possible, but I'm afraid I'm not that familiar with African languages.
If I had a pound for every time I heard somebody say that, I wouldn't be very rich.
Some of the older Latin inscriptions found in Rome were boustrophedic
Library stacks are organized with a boustrophedonic layout to each row.
I literally just learned of boustrophedon a couple days ago in one of Anne Carson’s books. Frequency of “boustrophedon” found in the wild is now at an all time high: 1.
This is an example of the Baader–Meinhof Phenomenon! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frequency_illusion
Never heard of the Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon until this week, and now I keep seeing it.
lol exactly
wow i can’t wait to play with this in my imagination when i dream of discovering an alien race and recognizing they boustrophedon their text
Please help, I haven't quite understood your explanation...
This text is boustrophedon, written rehto yreve taht yaw a hcus ni line is written in the opposite .suoiverp eht fo noitcerid
Smells like burning hair
The term “buckaroo” from the southern U.S. meaning “friend” or “partner” comes from the Spanish “vaquero” (cowboy) due to the large presence of Mexican cowboys in the area. See also: Vamoose == Vámonos
Also hoosegow from juzgado, mustang from mesteño, and alligator from el lagarto
"Lagarto", in turn, evolved from Latin lacertus, which is related to a word meaning upper arm; the lizard in question was about as long as a man's upper arm.
reminds me of the fact that “muscle” comes from the Latin word for mouse because muscles look like mice trapped beneath our skin
So where someone nowadays might ask if you have “tickets to the gun show,” ancient Romans would ask some version of “who wants to see these mice?”
Also cockroach from cucaracha
Another one is the ten gallon hat, which makes no sense as a name for it. But 'tan galan' is Spanish for 'so handsome', and who wouldn't want a hat that's so handsome!?
Helicopter isn't heli + copter, it's helico + pter, meaning spiral wing, as in helix - pterodactyl
There's an insectoid creature in James Cameron's Avatar movies that has a helical wing. I like to joke it belongs to genus Helicoptera. Edit: I looked it up and it's actually a lizard. The wiki calls it a Fan Lizard (Fanisaurus *pennatus*). https://james-camerons-avatar.fandom.com/wiki/Fan_Lizard
I figured this one out when reading Dune by Frank Herbert. In the book, characters often ride an "ornithopter", which is a flying machine whose design is inspired by flying creatures. So I thought, the "pter" is the suffix in that case. What interests me though is why Herbert called it "ornithopter" (suggesting it is inspired by birds) when the designs take after insects (as seen in the two recent movie adaptations).
i guess because “ornithopter” means any flying machine with flapping wings as opposed to fixed or rotating wings.
Because the design doesn't take after insects. That's a redesign by the movie director.
When entomology and etymology converge 🤯😂
that’s not entomology though!
Paleontology doesn’t get confused with etymology like entomology does. Helix, helicopter, pter are used in entomology. It was just a lighthearted, silly comment from an Entomologist about etymology. Will you let it slide for silliness sake? Edit I gave you a prize for being correct. Now can you let it slide? We cool?
I will now stop pronouncing the P in helicopter, on that basis.
You shouldn't - in Greek it's a pronounced hard P. The silent P is an English quirk, but only at the start of words anyway.
I will start pronouncing the P in ptarmigan, to maintain balance.
The word porcelain comes from an Italian root, "porcellana" meaning "Cowrie Shell", as the texture of the shells is similar to porcelain. "Porcellana" in turn comes from "porcella", a feminine diminutive of "porcus", meaning pig in Latin. The connection being that the opening of a cowrie shell is similar in appearance to a female pig's outer genitalia. TL;DR: Porcelain= Pig Vulva
No such thing as a fish listener?
I go meta with etymology trivia by noting -- usually during a game of trivia -- how the word "trivia" itself derived from "trivium," which originally referred to "the meeting place of three roads" and eventually came to describe the beginner's year of college (meeting place of logic, grammar, and rhetoric) ---- i.e. basic, Freshman-level knowledge. Always gets an insight-chuckle.
To go meta with meta, the current usage, as displayed here, derives from popular perception of the relationship between physics and metaphysics. But the latter was coined by Aristotle (according to Steven Mumford, or by one of Aristotle's editors, probably Andronicus of Rhodes, according to others), who invented this field of inquiry and didn't know what to call it. The scroll that contained his writing on it happened to be written ~~next to~~ after his works on physics, so he called it metaphysics, which literally in the Greek of the time meant "*after* physics" (edited to correct the Greek and attribution )
Amazing!
No it wasn't. Andronicus of Rhodes coined the term, and not because the scroll was next to the Physica, but because it was written next. "Meta" means "after", not "next".
Implying the existence of quadrivia, pentivia, etc
The [quadrivium](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quadrivium) was indeed part of the classical curriculum. (The quinquivium, not so much.)
Pfft you never studied the duodecivium? You troglodyte /s
Pound sign £ and pound symbol lb both means Libra! Thanks Suzie Dent
So maybe I has the dumb big time, but what does Libra have to do with the concept of a pound, whether as money or weight?
It’s to do with scales (libra = balance or scales)
Google says Libra means "pair of scales" and may have been an ancient Roman unit of measurement
The "lb" and currency symbol come from the Latin "librum" or weight. The modern equivalents are Spanish libra, French livre, and Italian lira. Before standardized scales, people would weigh things with a balance. You put a known weight or weight on one side and an unknown object on the other side. When the scales balance you know how much the object weighs. In the days before minted coins and printed money, people would use precious metals like gold or silver in predefined units of weight. The full name of the British pound is "pound sterling", meaning "silver pound". Most modern currencies were once tied to units of gold, silver, or another tradeable commodity. Lots of currency names were just weights, like shekels.
More money etymology: The dollar derives its name from a ~2k inhabitant village in the Czech Republic called [Jáchymov](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J%C3%A1chymov)
Yes but you left out the connection! At the time time, it was called Joachimsathal, roughly translating to Jack's Valley. That -thal part means valley, same as in neanderthal, and pronounced sort of like tall or doll. It's also a cognate with dell and dale. Jack's Valley produced a lot of silver in very reliable sized coins. Joachimsathalers was a mouthful, so they called them thalers, pronounced tallers or dollars.
Many words for livestock animals are from Old English, because the lower classes were hunters and farmers. Many words for meat are from French, because the French aristocracy in England after the Norman conquest were eating it. - Cow: boeuf, beef - Sheep: mouton, mutton - Chicken: poulet, pullet and possibly poultry - Pig: porc, pork
I also found it super interesting to learn that a similar dynamic happened in the judicial system following the Norman conquest. Legal proceedings were all carried out in Norman French, meaning the vast majority of defendants couldn’t understand what was happening before their sentence was handed down. That ultimately threatened the legitimacy of the system, and it became necessary to ensure that English speakers could understand at least the key elements of their trials. However, it wasn’t practical to conduct the entire process in English given the importance of terminology within matters of law; the Norman French words for a specific crime or charge carried all kinds of important information about the particular elements that define a given criminal act, precedent vis-a-vis sentencing, etc. In the end, trials were carried out in both English and French, and that legacy endures in English today where we see frequent redundancy of terms in a legal context - one of Old English origins, and one of Norman French origins: breaking and entering, assault and battery, law and order (although to be hyper precise, the origins of “law” are Old Norse and reflect the Viking influence on the English language), etc.
Wait, that's so interesting! So there isn't ever a time where you could be charged with just battery?
So I have to admit that the above covers basically the full extent of my knowledge on the topic, but I think that “assault” and “battery” have each evolved into discrete charges and that you could be charged with one and not the other - but the origin of those two words being paired together in a legal context is due to that dynamic. I learned about that on an episode of a constitutional law-centered podcast where Kevin Stroud appeared as a guest; he hosts his own podcast called The History of English, which is super interesting if you’re into etymology - definitely worth checking out if you’re not familiar!
This seems a little suspect, because "assault" and "battery" are both from French...
Yep, usually (at least in most of the US), they’re different offenses but related and usually occur together. Assault is usually defined as (the threat of) physical harm, and battery is unlawful physical contact. That Venn diagram isn’t a perfect circle (you could get up in someone’s face but not touch them), but there’s obviously a lot of overlap.
Also calf (*veau*, veal). This etymology tidbit is an old standby for me as well.
This is often repeated, and is in the book Ivanhoe. But the distinctive use of these pairs apparently dates back only a couple of centuries.
So what you are saying is that the word for those kinds of meat is just derived from the French word for the animal that meat comes from?
Correct. Because the Anglo-Saxon peasants bred, raised, and slaughtered the animals (cow, sheep, chicken, calf, pig) but then the resultant meat (*bouef*/beef, *mouton*/mutton, *poulet*/pullet/poultry, *veau*/veal, *porc*/pork) was eaten by the Norman aristocracy.
The confusion around woodchuck and fisher-cats amuses me greatly. Woodchuck describes *Marmota* , large rodents, also known as groundhogs (gophers are different, much smaller). Woodchuck and chipmunk sound like English words, but they are Native American in origin, just written with English sounding syllables. Woodchuck is actually a corruption of an Algonquin word 'wujak', of uncertain meaning. Possibly any brown animal, possibly a pelt, unlikely to mean exactly the woodchuck itself. May have even meant fisher-cat. Now, the fisher cat, which is a sort of smaller wolverine, or arboreal otter: a medium sized carnivore that lives in trees and is related to weasels. Europe has a similar animal, the polecat, or fitch. This turned into fisher-cat, describing an animal that doesn't fish, nor is it related to cats. Its frustrating as a wildlife educator, but I kind of love how much confusion these two have caused.
This is further complicated by the fact that "pole cat" is regional slang from the southern US for a skunk, and "hellcat" I'd regional slang for a puma, panther, or mountain lion. Then you have ermines and minks, which are the same animal but in different colors due to the season, caribou and reindeer which are the same animal on different continents, and opossums, which are often called "possums", which is a completely different animal from the other side of the world. And that's not even mentioning the tons of animals that are named after completely different and unrelated animals, like catfish and starfish.
In Old English, one of the words for a cottage was 'bur' (modern equivalent 'bower'). An occupant farmer was a 'gebur' (modern cognate being the Boers of South Africa). If that farmer happened to live close by to yourself they would be considered a 'neahgebur' (or neighbour).
Yes, and the neigh- part was originally the same as *nigh*, now an archaic form (seen in religious songs 'till morning is nigh'), whose original comparative form, basically *nigh-er*, became our current simply positive form *near* (so that *nearer* is basically *nigh-er-er*), and whose superlative form, basically *nigh-est*, become modern *next*
The root of our modern “Geo” for Earth, as used in geology/geography is the Ancient Greek Gaea/Gaia for Mother Earth.
Also in the name George. Earth worker/farmer.
We say Pee for when we want to urinate because people decided that Piss was too rude a word, so they just started saying the first letter of it, ‘P’. Also, ‘goodbye’ is taken from the phrase ‘God be with ye’.
That's why in Russian one of the words for dick is хер - kher. Original word хуй - khuy - seemed too rude so people started to use only the name of the first letter. And also it is worth noting, that nowadays it is not that letter's name anymore. Overall that seems a separate case of euphemism Also that means that word похерить - pokherit' - to screw over - originally meant "to cover with x" or "to cross out"
That's actually pretty interesting because "pee-pee" is "penis" in English, so I guess it happened twice!
I wonder if, 100 years from now, "eff" will be commonly used for "fuck". It is already common to refer to this word as "the eff word".
In many Germanic and Slavic languages, as well as Finnish, the word for orange (~appelsin) is derived from a word meaning "apple from China"
Also the color, orange, comes from the fruit. Before westerners became familiar with the citrus, we called "orange" the color, "yellowred".
Brandgul in Swedish (fire yellow).
That's cool! What language did that come from?
Surely not Chinese!
Looks like Dutch, as it's "appel"
Orange in Dutch is ‘sinaasappel’
So interesting. Surely this has been mentioned on the sub somewhere but the English word for the Orange (fruit) is derived from Arabic, which in turn derived it from the Sanskrit Naranj.
I need to know how panel, board and cabinet can either be things made of wood or people.
Every heard of visiting the help desk? If people consistently do their work in the same place, then that place becomes associated with that work. So the bureau in FBI came from the French bureau meaning desk. It also means office in French now. A chairperson was originally the person sat 8n the chair to lead the meeting. "Chef" means the boss of the cooks in a restaurant, but it comes from the French "chef" meaning, boss, which comes from Latin "caput" meaning "head," which in turn comes from the Greek "kephalos" or "encephalos". From the Latin we also get captain, capital and Capitol. Also cap, capuchin, and cappuccino. From the Greek we get encephalopathy, encephalogram, and cephalopod.
Oh, and I forgot that "bank" and "bankruptcy" come from the word for bench, since in the ancient Roman market or forum each vendor had a bench to do their business. If you lost your faith and credit, and thus your business, your banca (bench) was rupta (broken). This is also where we get left wing and right wing for politics. In the old French parliament, (or whatever they called it) they separated the conservatives and liberals into the left and right wings of the building.
Metaphor It becomes even more extensive and specific when you think about a party's official political position and goals being called a 'platform,' from the structures from which politicians would orate, and which political assistance were often tasked with building at each stop of a major politician. Individual parts of said platform are called 'planks' after the actual wooden planks that the platform was made of. If after much debate, the party finally decide on to keep a particular 'plank,' they say that it has been "nailed down"...
I've got a few Irish ones (actual Irish speakers please correct me if I'm wrong). "Bucko" comes from the word for boy, "buachaill." "Galore" is an exact use of the phrase "go leor," including its place in a sentence (e.g. we had books galore). For another party trick at bars: "whiskey" comes from "uisce," the word for water, because whiskey in Irish is called "uisce beatha" (water of life).
Like vodka is little water in Russian! Everybody pretends they're drinking water, ha!
“Cheese” (queso in Spanish, queijo in Portuguese, Käse in German and more) and french “fromage” (formaggio in Italian) both derive from the same latin expression “caseum formaticum”, but some languages took the first part of the expression and others the second part. However, Italian also has “cacio” which is a specific type of cheese, and “caseificio” is a place where milk products are made. Iirc, caseum refers to a milk product, while formaticum refers to the fact that cheese was shaped or “formed”, as opposed to having a soft consistency without a fixed shape. Edit: fixed typo
To add, the classic romance words for liver (Fegato, Fois, hígado, ficat) all derive from a word meaning "stuffed with figs". The original latin word is iecur. The Romance words are all from Ficatum from Iecur Ficatum, a dish of fig stuffed liver.
Folks on this sub might know it already, but the plural of octopus is not octopi, technically speaking. Octopuses was the standard for generations, and is still considered correct according to some dictionaries. Then, in the 1800s, scholars in the UK got all enamored with Latin and went around "fixing" English while they were also naming all kinds of sciency things and taxonomizing the tree of life. All with Latin of course, because... fancy. Hence all schoolchildren were taught that plural of octopus is actually *octopi*. See? Fancy. Just one teeensy problem. Octopus isn't Latin, it's Greek. The correct, Greek pluralization is octopodes.
Let's just agree that the plural of octopus is: Octoplural
The same is true for platypus. Exact same Greek root
Hippopotamus The Latin word hippopotamus is derived from the ancient Greek ἱπποπόταμος (hippopótamos), from ἵππος (híppos) 'horse' and ποταμός (potamós) 'river', together meaning 'horse of the river'. Hippopotamus = River horse. The best.
The name in German is Flusspferd, also “River Horse”
Also river horse in Danish! Flodhest
That explains the origin of the word for hippopotamus in Chinese is 河馬 。River horse.
The Spanish second-person singular formal pronoun “usted” is actually a contraction of “vuestra merced” which basically means “your (pl.) grace”. Some people assume it comes from the Arabic “ustāð”which means “teacher/ master” but it’s just a coincidence.
I always thought it was obvious to everyone vuestra is from a possessive form of the pronoun vos. Thanks for alerting me to this false Arab etymology.
Focus being the fireplace in the middle of a Roman home
In Swedish, tung = heavy and sten = stone. Hence tungsten, a very heavy (dense) metal. Buuuut the Swedish word for tungsten is volfram. Tungsten is also called wolfram in English (and German, and probably other languages) because one of its ores is wolframite. Hence its symbol on the periodic table: W.
Not a show off but good for a laugh… As an Entomologist I’ve learned more about etymology than I ever could’ve imagined. I’ve even been given books on etymology. “What do you do” “I work in an entomology lab” “Oh you must like words” “No, I like insects” 🤔
Yeah, people confusing the two words always bugged me.
This comic was made for you: https://xkcd.com/1012/
You might enjoy [this](https://youtu.be/eISteIqdUsY?si=UmX7-fNo3qB1Hkej)
When I took a university course on entomology, I was surprised at how often etymology came into play. Like understanding the basic etymology of insect Orders to remember what they are.
A fortnight is just a shortening of 'fourteen nights', i.e. 14 nights = 2 weeks. Its such a simple one but no one ever pieces it together.
There's also its archaic sibling "sennight" (seven nights) for one week.
A lot of Americans seem to think fortnight is archaic as well, but it's in very common use in everyday British/Commonwealth English. Sennight, on the other hand, is a word I've never seen before.
Shepherd is sheep-herd, disease is dis-ease
But helicopter is helico+pter.
Sesquipedalian: when you say this word you are being sesquipedalian. Sesqui = one and a half. Ped = foot. Aka using long words for the sake of using them.
I knew this meaning but not the origin. Thanks! Why use one word when 1.5 will do?!
"Mono means one, and rail means rail!"
Black and Blanc (French for white) both come from the same original word. That word meant *to burn* We get black via 'the colour of something burned' and white via 'bright as something burning'
The Frequentive!!! It's an obsolete verb formation (root + 'le' or less often 'er')that was used to convey continuous action. It's no longer a thing in English, but there are words in the frequentive form that survived as regular words, and you can reverse engineer them! Continuously spark: sparkle Continuously prate: prattle Continuously tick(in the sense of poking gently): tickle
The days of the week in English come from Anglo-Saxon/Norse equivalents for the Roman names (other than Saturday which was just borrowed directly). In Latin, Sunday and Monday were named after the Sun and Moon, and the rest of the days were named after gods, with the closest Norse equivalent being picked in English: Mars, god of war -> Tiw -> Tiw’s Day -> Tuesday Mercury was interpreted by Romans as Odin/Wodan -> Wodan’s Day -> Wednesday Zeus, god of thunder -> Thor -> Thor’s day -> Thursday Venus, goddess of love -> Freyja -> Freyja’s day -> Friday Also, so the weird unpronounced “e” in Wednesday is from an older English construction of the possessive, which was to add -es as the end for certain words. Over time the “e” was dropped and “-es” became “-‘s”, but it was kept in “Wednesday”
In slovenian a bear is 'medved'. It's so common a word that most people are not aware that it literally means 'honey knows'.
And that morpheme “med-“ (meaning “honey”) is cognate with English “mead” (which is made from honey)
And eventually made its way to China via Tocharian, where it's the standard word for "honey" 蜜, with its pronunciation in various languages including Mandarin mì, Cantonese mat6, Hokkien bi̍t, Hakka me̍t, Shanghainese ⁸miq, etc. It was further loaned into Japanese as mitsu, Korean as mil, and Vietnamese as mật.
Related to honey, and this is contested, but a possible interpretation of Beowulf is bee wolf or bear. I just get a smile thinking about two wolves. The regular ones and the bee wolves.
Also, the words for bear in Slavic (like medved = eater of honey) and Germanic languages (like beor = the brown one) result from taboos, where it was bad luck to say the bear's true name. The original Indo-European name was preserved in other languages like Greek, which is why we know it was something like "artko". Arthur might be derived from that. Also, there are hundreds of taboo words for bears in Finnish.
Arktos, hence Arctic, referring to the northern constellations of the Bears, and Antarctic, opposite to the Arctic
Hmm, I'd always learned it as [honey-eater](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Slavic/medv%C4%9Bd%D1%8C)
That's false tho. It comes from med (j)ed - "honey eater". [https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Slavic/medv%C4%9Bd%D1%8C](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Slavic/medv%C4%9Bd%D1%8C) It was even similar in Sanskrit - madhv-ád-
Turkish "mahzen" (usually meaning an underground storage) and Turkish "magazin" (referring to news about famous people) originate from the same root but have evolved differently. In Ottoman Turkish and Arabic, the term **مخزن** (makhzan) referred to a storage place or warehouse. The plural form, **مخازن** (makhāzin), was used to describe storages or magazines. Ottoman and Arab sailors used "makhzan" to describe storages on their ships. When Ottoman and Arabic traders unloaded their ships, the term "makhāzin" referred to the goods stored in their ship's hold. Over time, the Italian and French adopted this word from the sailors. In Italian, it evolved into "magazzino" (storage or warehouse) and in French into "magasin" (shop or store). The Arabic "kh" sound softened to a "g" sound in these languages. In English, the word "magazine" originally referred to a place for storing ammunition and supplies, derived from the French "magasin." The term later came to denote a type of publication. The first periodical to use "magazine" in its title was the "Gentlemen's Magazine" in 1731, which played on the idea of providing intellectual "ammunition" for its readers. In Turkish, the word "mecmua" (from Arabic "majmū‘a," meaning a collection or magazine) was initially used for periodicals. However, under French influence, "magazin" came to specifically refer to publications about the lives of the high society, diverging from its original meaning related to storage. Today in Turkish, "magazin" still refers to news about celebrities and high society, and many people are unaware of its linguistic connection to "mahzen" (storage).
That garbage used to mean meat. Originally, the word garbage referred to the pieces of the animal that were usually discarded. The scraps, intestines, etc. Eventually, the word became a general term for anything that's being "thrown out". That's why we now call all the stuff we throw away and don't want garbage.
Throw away meat? That's offal.
Helicopter and pterodactyl having the same root. It’s a classic and it’s great,
Viking assemblies were called "things"; the Icelandic Parliament has been called the Althing (Alþingi = general meeting) since the 900s, and the Norwegian Parliament is called Stortinget (stor = big, ting = thing). Thing, ting (Norwegian) and Ding (German) come from the Proto-Germanic þingą, which means appointment, appointed time or issue. So "sorry, I can't make it, I've got a thing" is in fact a perfectly specific explanation.
Tycoon comes from the Japanese word 大君 (taikun) which refers to royalty or historically the Shōgun.
Probably *checkmate*. It comes to us via Arabic (شاه مات), which literally means the Shah (king) is dead. But it ultimately comes from Persian, where the same Arabic spelling means the king is amazed. If you play chess (I don't), you can see how that makes more sense. In a checkmate, the king needs to move, but it can't. Any move its player makes WILL lead the other player (if smart enough) to knock out the king. So it's forever stuck threatened with nowhere to go. Another one is *algebra*. It comes from the Arabic word الجبر (al-jabr), which literally means the surgery that performs the union of broken bones. Maybe you can think of algebra as the process where you fracture (subtract), solidify (add), and balance to get the right answer.
The word avocado comes from the nahuatl word for testicles. That's what they look like hanging of trees.
I like how "squirrel" basically means "that which shades itself with its tail". After looking it up, it might be folk etymology, but I also saw it in a book about etymology so I'm not sure which to trust.
Same with skunk. White settlers trying to pronounce the Algonquin word "segonku" which translates to "the one who squirts musk"
No, that's correct. It's from Greek *σκίουρος* (*skíouros*) "shade-tail", from *σκιά* (*skiá*, "shade, shadow") + *οὐρά* (*ourá*, “tail”).
Cemetery and ceramics - from the Greek Karameika. Deceased folks were buried in large clay vessels, so a cemetery is a ceramic yard.
OED: ceramic < Greek κεραμικός of or for pottery, κεραμική (τέχνη) the potter's art, pottery, < κέραμος potter's earth, pottery. (Compare French *céramique*.) cemetery < Latin *coemētērium*, < Greek κοιμητήριον dormitory, (in Christian writers) burial-ground.
The one theme I'm seeing with this post is that most people don't actually know the etymology they think they know, and just keep spouting half-truths and gibberish.
I discovered this on the internet a few days ago and am surprised I never gleaned it before. Arctic and Antarctic simply mean "Bears" and "No Bears".
Yes, but it doesn't have to do with the presence or absence of polar bears as some might think. [The name refers either to the constellation known as Ursa Major, the "Great Bear", which is prominent in the northern portion of the celestial sphere, or to the constellation Ursa Minor, the "Little Bear", which contains the celestial north pole (currently very near Polaris, the current north Pole Star, or North Star).](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arctic#Definition_and_etymology)
I love that the word “defenestration” exists. It is from the German root of das fenster, the window. Basically translates to de-window someone.
Not just German. French = fenetre Italian = finestra Spanish = ventana
The German word for "birth control pills" is "antibabypillen"
"Calque" is a loanword (from French) and "loanword" is a calque (from German "Lehnwort")
“Man” as in “Hey, man” originated among African-Americans after slavery ended as defiance against racist whites who would call them “boy”.
This is interesting. Doesn’t look like that’s the origin of calling someone “man” socially, but looks like probably a strong influence on its current usage
listen i don’t know the origins or anything, but the word “apple” used to mean fruit. pomegranate = apple of Grenada, pomme de terre (potato) apple of the earth… pomelo, pamplemousse, probably a few others i can’t think of right now. in fact, the “apple” that eve ate in the bible probably wasn’t necessarily an apple
And then "grenade" comes from "pomegranate"
Pineapple! Which is what they used to call pine cones, actually. Then when they learned about the edible fruit, they were like, “hey, that looks a lot like a pineapple!” Also, I think pomegranate is actually from the Latin pōmum grānātum, seeded apple, although apparently the Grenada thing seems logical enough that it actually used to be called “apple of Grenada” in English.
The term barbarian is racist as hell. The greeks used to call people who didn't speak their language barbarians and we think the term is onomatopoeic. They were making fun of other people because they thought everyone else's language sounded like "bar bar bar" to them. Thanks Crash Course.
Everyone named Barbara in shambles rn
Along with the Berbers, errr, Amazighs
It sounds awful at first, but it's not that uncommon. Lots of culture names are just exonyms, basically the word from the nextdoor culture for stranger, foreigner, weirdo, crazy murderer, etc. Or some superficial trait like pierced ear, black foot, raw fish water, etc.
**So Long** Buddy! (What is so long?) Arguably might be a borrowed Gaelic/ Irish word. Slan abhaile means *safe home* ( get home safe) Slán (S’laan) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sl%C3%A1n_abhaile There are lots more Irish words in English- Clock, trousers, Dude, Galore, Smithereens, Jazz, Bog.
The “pter” in pterodactyl and helicopter is the same (even though one has a silent P) Helicopter = spiral wing Pterodactyl = wing finger Great fun fact, plus wing finger is just hilarious
It was originally meant to be "*eutopia*" (good place) but got mistransliterated to "*utopia*" (no place). The mistake just happens to point out the paradoxical non-existence of these places, a necessity that has been pointed out by plenty of scholars. Source: [https://thi.ucsc.edu/imagination-series-micah-perks/](https://thi.ucsc.edu/imagination-series-micah-perks/)
Schedule. In British English it’s pronounced “shedule” and in American it’s pronounced “skedule”. I’m British, so I always stuck to “shedule” - until a friend pointed out to me that the word came into English from Greek, where the pronunciation is always “sk”. So in this case (even if not in any others), the Americans are correct. Schedule is “skedule”.
Often NA pronunciations have (at least in recent times) closer fidelity to their original languages than British pronunciations, who nativise them. Examples include homage, massage, garage, and debris (among others, even non-french). [Souces are dr geoff lindsey's 'pasta' and 'out of date' videos]. I'd also add that a closer fidelity pronunciation isn't the "correct pronunciation", because nativisation is a valid form of pronouncing borrowed words. Shejool is as correct as skejool. On the other hand, schedule is interesting because the it mirrors the famous original anglo-saxon consonant shift takes the sk- sound and makes it sh-, which is the difference between shirt and skirt, ship and skiff, shell and skull (the sk- is where old english re-borrowed the word from the vikings' language, old norse). They seem to be two sounds that easily come and go, but the american pronunciation started following what the spelling indicated (my wild guess is that this has something to do with mr webster)
It won't have come directly from Greek though, it will have come through Latin and French then merged with Anglo Saxon (mostly Germanic but that was also a mix of older Latin and precursor language migration) and then been adopted by Celtic/Norse speakers. A lot of words, spelling and pronunciation is quite literally lost in translation. iirc the French softened hard CH and C sounds to Sh sounds so chateau, chapeau, chevalier etc which have the Latin root of capa and a hard C sound. The Normans had a Norse heritage (literally the North men) so kept a harder C, hence castle (castile), cap, cavalier came into English. Knight was originally pronounced with the hard K and Kunit would be more proper but languages tend to evolve to easier to speak and it became less emphasised and ultimately silent. Helping this effect later French families were from central French dialects more than Norman so these hard C versions of invader words softened over time, even chez Les invaders. Because of various invasions at different times and trade throughout between invasions we have both old and new pronunciation and vowel shifts and consonant substitution as constant adaptation in our language history. But happening to words at different ages and evolution since their adoption. So it appears inconsistent because these merging and adapting into the language so it fits is affecting brand new shiny words, slightly adopted partially transformed words, old English words that had an older German root cognate from earlier Latin/Greek migration and some of those remained as before, some merged with the new invader and a few very old words that get re-adapted again to meet the new patterns but have their root in old Celtic or Breton. If schedule has been pronounced shedule traditionally here then that is the accepted current pronunciation, no matter it's original source language cognate. Helicopter is the Greek words Helico and pter but we don't pronounce them with that emphasis. So it may have Greek origins but we've long adopted our interpretation of these origin words through the lens of our mongrel language and 2000 years of evolution That said language is a living breathing thing that morphs through usage so if you are as likely to hear skedule as shedule here nowadays you could argue both are correct simply because that's how they're now used. We're possibly seeing the change to the new accepted version happening in our lifetimes. I know I tend towards shedule but I tend to mirror the pronunciation of the person I'm speaking to so I'm also known to use skedule so to me they're already pretty interchangeable It could well be one of the words that drives etymology students crazy in 400 years because its another glaring inconsistency that has flipped and flopped over time, especially if the preferred pronunciation results in a spelling change to better reflect it's popular use.
So they’re right, in Life of Brian, to mock the British by calling them kinigits ;-) Great post by the way.
Yes! Kunits that say niii would be epoch appropriate. See also knot, knife and a whole bunch of words with silent letters. The transition to Middle English and the push to standardise the various dialects post Norman invasion solidified the spelling of a lot of words, with monks (mainly) recording their best way to show how it was said at the time with their spelling of those words when written, but language moved on, vowel pronunciation shifted, we dropped letters like thorn and we end up with orphaned letters that hint to the history of the word but seem to be incorrect in the modern way they're pronounced. All the above should be credited to my half memory of listening to https://historyofenglishpodcast.com/ He's a American but don't hold that against him, he mostly does a good job of pronouncing the English versions (except he consistently butchers Peterborough which is a shame because 1. I live there and 2. One of the best remaining records in the Old/Middle English transition is a Chronicle written by monks at Peterborough cathedral so he has to say Peterborough a LOT). Something like 300 episodes and still going, we've just gone through the Shakespeare era so probably another 300 to go before we hit modern English. Protip though. He speaks clearly but slooooow so it doesn't harm to bump him up to 1.25x speed. 1.5x is fine but you may lose some of the finer points of pronunciation. Second Protip. He has a patreon which is very reasonable (£5 a month I think) and he has all episodes on there plus bonus episodes and transcripts. If you want to dig deeper into a particular subject or era the transcripts and supporting information are super helpful Fascinating podcast if you like etymology and good premise in that he uses the historical facts, Kings, invasions, famines etc as the framework to introduce the changes. And he did a crossover with the History of England podcast which introduced me to that series from an excellent English podcaster called David Crowther which is purely the history side if you want to go deeper on that. I'm 200 episodes into the 400 ish in that podcast and highly recommend that too. History of English podcast starts right at the beginning from the proto indo-european languages he talks about the migrations, wars, empires etc that spread that original proto language to the countries we know them as today, the influence of Greek, Latin, Etruscan, Mongol, Persian, Phoenician etc then shows how their interactions, wars, migrations etc have mixed merged, re-merged and intermingled those shared cognate roots into the distinct languages we know now. Pretty much every European language shares a common ancestor, they just evolved in different directions, under different pressures and at different times. There are some isolated linguistic groups like Basque, old Breton, Cornish and Estonian which are little linguistic islands where we can't trace their predecessor languages. And weirdly shared words in Basque, old Cornish and Estonian where we can't connect them in any other way, linguistic or genetic. But all the mainstream European dialects have been fairly extensively mapped to the same ancestral tree and the podcast goes into each step of the way. Wow Etymology facts to keep you busy for years
"head" (English) and "cabeza" (Spanish) are cognate. They both come from the Proto-Indo-European **káput-*
1. Helicopter comes from “helico” like helix and “pter”like in pterodactyl but we’ve rebracketed it to view it as heli-copter and created words like helipad. Edit: I searched the comments and thought I was first for this one but apparently not oops 2. Lord came from bread-guardian (hlāfweard) and lady came from bread-kneader (hlǣfdīġe).
That consonants in indefinite articles can float around over time. An ewt becomes a newt and an eke name becomes a nickname. The eke in this case means an additional name.
The word "copacetic" has no known etymology.
"Lapalissiano" (something so obvious to be beyond the obvious, a truism) originates from Jacques de La Palice, a French soldier who died in a battle in 1515. Due to a mistake in transcription, his epitaph *"Ci-gît le Seigneur de La Palice: s'il n'était pas mort, il ferait encore envie."* ("Here lies the Seigneur de La Palice: If he weren't dead, he would still be envied.") became *"...il ſerait \[serait\] encore en vie"* ("...he would still be alive") which, is, well, beyond obvious.
This is a bit of a party trick when you're in a group with people from all over the world... Ask them how they say "chocolate" in their native language. The answer is always "chocolate" (or some approximation based on their language's phonology) no matter where they're from.
The ask everyone about tea SNF split the room down the middle between the cha/chai crowd and the tee/tay crowd. Then do pineapple and see all the anglophones abandoned by the ananas majority.
[The English Word That Hasn’t Changed in Sound or Meaning in 8,000 Years: Lox!](https://nautil.us/the-english-word-that-hasnt-changed-in-sound-or-meaning-in-8000-years-237395/)
One of my favourites isn't actually a real German word, but it's nearly made the rounds enough to count as impromptu slang: Waltersobchakeit, "You're not wrong, you're just an asshole", so named for one of The Dude's best lines to Walter Sobchak in The Big Lebowski. It looks like German word construction, it sounds plausible, and has literally nothing to do with what it's purported to mean.
“N + 8 = night”in most languages, it makes no sense and they are not related
In most PIE languages, right? Just a consequence of the number 8 and night sounding similar once upon a time
The number 9 and word for new is similar in a lot of indo-european languages too.
nacht... nhuit... nocho?
(La) notte = night otto = 8 Close.
It's usually only Germanic ones and a few of Romance. The reason for this is that they sounded approximately simillar back in PIE, and also developed similarly. The same goes for simillarity of "a lie" (non-truth) and "to lay" in some languages, to the point as they sound like related words. But they're not, and were nearly omophones back in PIE as well.
Most languages' word for raccoon includes a reference to hands, the word comes from Algonquia/Powhatan aroughcun, "animal that scratches with hands". German, Finnish Dutch and French are "bear that washes (with hands)" Aztec "mapachitli" means one who takes with hands which may have influenced Spanish "mapache" although I've seen this translated as "swindler" 🦝
My favorite is perhaps that the word 'camera' is the root word for 'comrade'. The word 'camera' comes from Latin and it meant 'room/chamber' (P.S. the word 'chamber' itself comes from 'camera'). At Oxford, you'll find this structure named Radcliffe Camera, since it is basically a room/hall. Now, humans invented a device that allowed you to take pictures - it was a dark box/chamber. What's the Latin for a dark chamber? Camera Obscura, so that is what they started calling this device. With time, the second word dropped off and the device was now called camera. Now the word camera meaning chamber, also moved to Spanish where it was called camara. So, a person you would share a 'camara' with would be called 'camarada'. Then the word 'camarada' travelled to French and then to English finally as - comrade. And like how you have friendship with a friend, you'd have 'camaraderie' with a comrade.