554: Chiropteran and Feather Jun 14, 2016

What has hands and wings?: perhaps some renderings of dragons, but consistently, bats. The taxonomic order in biology for bats is 'chiropteran' which comes from the parts meaning 'hand' (see Word Facts June 11, 2016) and 'wing'. The Greek word 'pteran' is also related to the English word, 'feather'. The Latin word for 'feather', 'penna' (see Word Facts February 2, 2016) and here, 'pteran' both share the p-sound. That consonant, and many other consonants shifted, for example p changed to in this case f, separating the Romance and Greek languages from the Germanic languages in a systematic manner. For more on other sound-shifts, see Word Facts Mar 6, 2016.