2662: 3 Names for Z Apr 1, 2022
The letter Z in America is called 'zee' and basically everywhere else in the anglophone world, 'zed'. There is a third version though, widely used nowhere, called 'izzard', though this was somewhat more popular in the 18th century. Unlike the other two which either follows the pattern of other letters 'cee; dee; tee' or following the Greek zeta. Instead, this form probably comes from the French 'ézed', though the word now is ‘zède‘.
2622: Alkaline & Basic: Why 2 Words Feb 19, 2022
Something that is an alkaline is described as being basic, but this is a totally different root. The reason that a substance's alkalinity is denoted as basic is because 'basic' is the more generic term; all alkalis are basic but not all bases are alkaline. A base will always neutralize an acid creating a salt and water but only alkalis, alkali metal hydroxide specifically, will dissolve in water. Though 'alkali' is only a specific term, originating from Arabic meaning 'the ashes' some of the meanings of 'base' have overlapped with it.
2622: Archipelago & the Aegean Sea Feb 18, 2022
The word 'archipelago' came to English from Greek originally as a proper noun, but even now in Greek it isn't used that way. The word ἀρχιπέλαγος (archepelagos) in Ancient Greek referred to the Aegean Sea, and later denoted the islands within it. The word means 'chief sea', and even though it is ancient, it is less mythical in its source than the current name for the sea. The name, also in Latin 'Archipelago', was still popularly in use around parts of Europe until the modern era.
2619: Greek Name for Mars Feb 15, 2022
English has lots of words with 'pyro-' like 'pyromaniac' from the Greek word for 'fire', but their word for the planet Mars, Pyroeis, which literally 'the fiery' we did not go with. Instead, we took took the Roman name 'Mars', a deity of war, because its red color was associated with blood. The Greek name was for the same reason, though it went in another direction.
2615: Why No W- in 'Holistic'? Feb 11, 2022
Though there is a version 'wholism', far and away the more common and more standard spelling is 'holism', without the W-. Still, when referencing wholeness, as it were, so it might cause someone to wonder why this differentiation around W- was made. This is due to the fact that the term was coined in 1926 attempting to resemble Greek more closely, from ὅλος (holos) meaning 'whole'. That said, the W- is only from a dialect-form from the 15th century, and in Old English the word was hāl without the W-, so really the question could be asked the other way around.
2612: iris Feb 8, 2022
The word 'iris' is the name for a flower as well as part of the eye. Both of these senses comes from the Ancient Greek ἶρις (îris) meaning 'rainbow', because this part of the eye deals with color, and the flower is named because it resembled the shape of the iris of the eye. More directly though, there is a Greek messenger deity who is both represented by the rainbow and gives certain significance to it, with some references using 'iris' to mean both messenger and rainbow. The root of this word means 'to twist' and is related to the English word 'wire', and the element iridium, which gives off many colors when dissolved.
2611: prune & plum Feb 7, 2022
There are a few cases where dried fruits have completely different names to the normal version, but this is pretty rare. Prunes for instance are dried plums, but this is just because the the Ancient Greek προῦνον (proûnon) means 'plum', likely borrowed from a native Anatolian language. The word 'plum' does not have a separate origin though, and merely stems from the Latin form 'prunum' which morphed over time into the English form. The Modern Greek word for a plum now is δαμάσκηνο (damaskino) meaning Damascus.
2600: Sulfur & Sulphur: Why the Difference Jan 27, 2021
British English spelling tends to represent the more traditional version, but not always. The 'PH' in 'sulphur' has no basis in English. Usually, a 'PH' to represent the [f] means that it was spelt with a φ (Phi) in Greek, but 'sulfur' is not from Greek. Moreover, the spelling in Latin or French where English adopted this spelling is also not with a 'PH'. This is where the American English spelling comes from, with the British spelling being a result of a later insert.
2594: cancer & crabs Jan 21, 2022
Cancer is known to be related to crabs because of the zodiac symbol, but the relation is much deeper in fact. The word 'cancer', which now particularly associated with the disease, is because the enlarged veins around cancerous tumors were thought to look like the the legs of crabs. In Latin 'cancer' means 'crab', which itself is from Ancient Greek καρκίνος (karkínos) via metathesis. This is also where the word 'canker' is from, as well as 'chancre', both types of ulcers.
2591: mathematics & wiskunde Jan 17, 2022
Most language's words for mathematics around Europe borrow directly from Ancient Greek μαθηματικός (mathēmatikós), except for Dutch which uses 'wiskunde'. This is not so exceptional as it might look at first glance however, since it is not a totally unique word per se but a calque, insofar as it is just translated literally. Before this 'mathematica' was used in Dutch but this purism was introduced in the 16th century. 'Wiskunde' would mean 'known art' or more to the point "art of what is known", & likewise in Ancient Greek μαθηματικός (mathēmatikós) breaks down to mean 'of knowledge'.
2582: tectonic, text, and architecture Jan 8, 2022
The word 'tectonic', relating to the structure of the Earth's crust, is probably from the German 'tektonisch' of broadly similar meaning, but that is from Latin tectonicus meaning 'of an architect'. This root, from the Greek τέκτων (téktōn) for 'carpenter' doesn't seem to have much to do with geology nor related English words like 'text' or 'technician', but but its association with buildings and structures, still seen clearly in the German 'architektonisch' and indeed English 'architecture'.
2577: charm & charisma Jan 3, 2022
The words 'charm' and 'charisma' are not related, though this fact is often confused in particular because of how they are used for certain Biblical translations as it pertains to the Holy Spirit. 'Charisma' is from the Ancient Greek χᾰ́ρῐσμᾰ (khárisma) for 'grace; gift', ultimately from χαίρω (khaírō) meaning 'I am happy'. 'Charm' on the other hand, both as it relates to magic and to personality types comes from the Latin 'carmen' which meant both 'song' and 'incantation', or as it were 'chant' and 'enchant'. Both terms have been used for translating ideas of speaking in tongues or other trance-like experiences.
2576: disk and tisch Jan 2, 2022
Though dishes can be concave and tables usually not, it is the idea of flatness which links the two together. Words like 'disk', but also 'desk', 'dish', and the German 'Tisch' (table) are all from the Greek δίσκος (dískos). In its original form this meant 'disk' as we use it now, and hence the Greek athletic 'discus'. This root was adopted into a Proto-Germanic language via Latin, eventually becoming German 'Tisch', Dutch 'dis' for 'table'—though this last word is far less common than tafel (table) or berd (board)—and the English 'dish'. English took a different root for 'table', but the story is similar.
2572: milk Dec 28, 2021
The English words 'milk' and 'lactose' obviously have related meanings, but moreover they share a common root. There is a clear set of relationships across Germanic languages for milky words like Milch (German), melk (Dutch/Afrikaans), as well as in Slavic languages молоко (moloko) in Russian, or mleko/mlijeko (Serbo-Croatian/Slovenian). Conversely, across Romance languages this is less clearly related with French 'lait', Spanish 'leche', and Italian 'latte' to the Ancient Greek γάλακτος (gálaktos) from γάλα (gála), but each of these comes from the same Proto-Indo-European root.
2571: galaxy & milky way Dec 27, 2021
This galaxy is referred to as the Milky Way, but really it should not be so generic. The Ancient Greek γάλακτος gálaktos, from γάλα (gála), means 'milk'. This was used in Medieval times to refer to our galaxy only, due to the hazy, white band of light as seen in the night sky without other star-gazing devices. This was then applied to all galaxies, but that name wouldn't make much sense to describe other places.
2570: Empathy: A False Friend Dec 26, 2021
English has two words, 'empathy' and 'sympathy', that clearly share a root and have similar meaning. The Greek '-πάθεια' ending means 'suffering'—in this case describing one's ability to understand another's pain—but in Greek εμπάθεια (empátheia) means 'malice'. A more literal translation of the Greek, though lacking the necessary negative connotation, could be 'passion', but would not be a desired quality. The reason behind this apparent division is that the English version was chosen as a deliberate if imperfect attempt to translate the German 'Einfühlung', rather than being trying to capture the Greek meaning.
2569: Greek Re-Borrowing 'Cinema' Dec 25, 2021
While English has a number of regional words for movie theater, including 'cinema', and this word has permeated many other languages. Originally from Greek κίνημα (kínima) meaning 'movement' and the same root as 'kinetic' led to the German 'Kino' (from 'Kinematograph') via the French 'cinéma(tographe)'. This was the later reborrowed into Greek σινεμά (sinemá) with that same meaning.
2563: Boustrophedon Dec 19, 2021
Boustrophedon is a style of writing, theoretically in any linear script, wherein the direction of the writing on each line alternates. This will mean in Greek for example the first line will be right-to-left and the next line will be left-to-write. It can be done with the letters rotating on the horizontal- or vertical axis. This practice was done relatively commonly in the ancient world and many clay tablets exist from Greece and the surrounding areas especially with those styles in place. 'Boustrophedon' anyway takes its name from Greek meaning 'turning bull'.
2561: aorist Dec 17, 2021
People will be familiar with past or present tense, but fewer will have heard of the aorist tense. This is really only applied to Ancient Greek verbs which were simple and undefined. Unlike the typical understanding of tense, this exists outside a description of time, but still exists alongside all verbal moods (e.g. indicative; subjunctive), persons, voices (e.g. active; passive), etc.. This is used for many purposes, one narrative use being for stating things as truthful, or generally consistent, not bound by time per se.
2560: Iotacism Dec 16, 2021
Iotacism, also referred to as 'itacism' describes the shift of diphthongs or groups of vowels converging into the [i] sound. This pattern is not named for a speech impediment like with sigmatism or lambdacism, but for communitywide sound-shifts as on the naming pattern of rhotacism or zetacism. Greek is notable for its iotacism, since in Modern Greek, the letters and letter pairs which used to represent all totally different sounds ι, η, υ, ει, οι, υι are all said now as [i].