2253: John Doe & Other Stand-In Names Feb 15, 2021
'John Doe' is the name given to men when there is not another name given for whatever reason for law enforcement in the US. More exist in the US for other purposes such as John Q. Public, and of course around the world similar names have been created. In Ancient Rome even the name was 'Numerius Negidius' for the defendant—a play on actual given names that comes to mean "I refuse to pay"—while 'Aulus Agerius', another pun-name from the verb 'agere' meaning 'to set in motion'. In some modern European countries another Latin one is used, but it isn't a pun; Nomen Nescio (n.n.) just means "I do not know the name". In religious Jewish contexts and sometimes secular Israeli ones, the name פלני אלמני (Ploni Almoni) is used as a stand-in, which is originally found in the Book of Ruth probably as a euphemism for Boaz. More on this at another point.
2252: nova Feb 13, 2021
Along with 'novel' and 'novice', the Latin 'novus' (feminine 'nova) meaning 'new' also led to a couple literally stellar words like 'nova' and by extension 'supernova'. This is from the phrase 'stella nova' (new star) because at least in the 16th century, the sudden expanding brightness of a nova was thought to be a new star. These were only distinguished from supernovae in the 1930's which was actually the phenomenon that occurred in the 1572 description that led to the coining of the term.
2251: boor & boer Feb 12, 2021
In the same way as 'villain' has only negative connotations today but once denoted peasant farmers, the same process occurred with the word 'boor' or also 'boorish'. Though perhaps not quite as evil, it is still is by no means positive, referring to an ill-mannered person. This word is also originally borrowed, here from the Dutch 'boer' meaning 'farmer', as in the South African Boers (e.g. "Boer Wars"). This root is actually fairly far reaching and led to other words like 'bower' (i.e. birdcage) or the Dutch 'buur' ('neighbor'), the -by suffix denoting habitation (e.g. Selby, Whitby).
2249: villain & villa Feb 10, 2021
The word 'villain' has been made popular especially in fiction, but as often happens with fiction, the truth—or in this case etymology—is made more exciting. The word in entered Middle English through the French 'vilein' from the same root as 'villa', the initial sense meaning 'rustic'. More specifically, the noun referred to a farmhand or peasant, but with that came negative connotations of being boorish, clownish, or even scoundrelly. Indeed, not only did this quite pejorative sense develop in English, but also in the Modern French 'vilain'.
2250: test Feb 11, 2021
While there are a number of words surprisingly related to 'testify' or 'testimony', 'test' is not one of them. This word actually for much of history both in English and the original Latin referred to a potsherd, or another small piece of pottery. The sense which it currently holds of an examination is relatively modern, deriving from the notion of checking molten metal in a mold, which eventually superseded the original sense of the word.
2240: The Transformation of 'Hide' pt. 2 Feb 1, 2021
Previously, it was discussed how 'hide' (verb) has a vast array of related words; many closer related than 'hide' as a noun. These may seem surprising on the surface, like 'sky' and 'shoe', but also consider that 'hide' has changed a lot over time too. Take for instance that the verb used to be weak, which is to say it would have conjugated like
hide-hided-hided rather than
hide-hid-hidden
In general, the tendency is to expect that as time goes on, the creation and productivity of these so-called strong verbs—verbs that indicate tense with changing the internal vowel—to decline.
2233: fawn & fawn Jan 25, 2021
Little fawns may be cute, but the verb 'fawn' and the noun aren't related. Indeed, the nominal form, such as to denote a young deer is closer related to the word 'fetus' than to the verbal form 'fawn'. While now 'fawn' and 'fetus' look to only share one, initial sound ([f]), looking to the Vulgar Latin *fetonem it should clarify things. This evolved into the Old French 'faon' from the Latin fētus (offspring) understood to come ultimately from a root meaning 'suckle', and referred to any young creature as late as the 17th century. 'Fawn' as a verb on the other hand is closer related to 'fain', originally in the sense of 'rejoice'. Those two words have both shifted meaning somewhat, with 'fawn' coming to mean 'exaggerated flattery; swooning', and 'fain' meaning 'happy, relative to the circumstance'.
2231: petticoat, cotillion, and cotte Jan 23, 2021
As mentioned, the word 'coat' comes from the French 'cotte', but this is not the only word derived from it in English. Now obsolete in French opting for 'manteau', it is really only found in the phrase cotte de mailles (chainmail). That said, it also gave rise, somewhat unsurprisingly, to 'petticoat' (though now this describes a type of skirt, it was once an undercoat, but also to 'cotillion', a type of dance. Cotillion, which once had the same meaning as 'petticoat' i.e. 'small coat', now has the sense of referring to any formal dance-event, but in the 17th century referred to a specific dance in which one would raise her dress enough to display the petticoat.
2229: clog Jan 21, 2021
A clog today refers to any sort of block, and much like with ‘block’ itself, its origins are essentially wooden. Although the precise root of ‘clog’ is unknown, it used to denote a mass of wood, related to the word ‘log’ and Norwegian ‘klugu’ (knotted wood). The word, once also used to denote large jewelry or testes only retains any connection to wood in the case of the shoes, clogs.
2228: scandal & slander Jan 20, 2021
Although the overall meaning has generalized, the word 'scandal' has always been negative, originally from Ancient Greek σκάνδαλον (skándalon) referring to a trap lain for an enemy to fall into. In that sense, it is also related to the Latin 'scandere' (to climb) but it also referred to something that causes a moral fall. In Ecclesiastical Latin 'scandalum' went from meaning something which causes malfeasance to something causing discreditation, though bear in mind this may not have only been cultural but also influenced from words like the Old English 'scand' (disgrace). Moreover, the word 'slander' is related via the Old French 'esclandre' (scandalous statement) with the L added somewhat curiously.
2227: Aubergine vs. Eggplant (& Why) Jan 19, 2021
Around the anglophone world, between 'eggplant' and 'aubergine', only the Brits and Irishmen favor the latter. First off, the name 'eggplant' comes as a description of the white variety [see photo], and not the more popular purple ones of today, though this same pattern is also found in other languages like Icelandic with 'eggaldin' or Welsh 'planhigyn ŵy'. Outside of that, the reason South Africa, New Zealand, and Australia also use 'eggplant' is that this term is slightly older than 'aubergine', with the written first record in the US from 1763. Now, the white variety are called 'garden eggs'. 'Aubergine' is not only popular in the UK but also much of Western Europe like in French and German because the more diverse varieties from Southeast Asia (brought via the Middle East), using the Arabic اَلْبَاذِنْجَان (al-bāḏinjān) or literally 'the eggplant', originally from the Sanskrit वातिगगम (vātiga-gama) or 'plant that curls in wind'. The Arabic 'al-' turns to 'au-' in French, which is fairly typical. Other English speaking areas especially in Southeast Asia use the word 'brinjal'.
2222: How 'Issue' Became a *Problem* Jan 14, 2021
The word 'issue' is gradually taking on more negative connotations from simply meaning 'topic of concern' to 'matter of difficulty'. This process is nothing new however, as seen in the word 'problem'. There are still neutral senses of that word such as in 'math problem' (some people may see that as personally negative but that feeling is extralinguistic). Historically, the word meant anything put forth as a matter of discussion, and its constituent elements 'pro-' (forward) '*-blem' (from Greek 'ballein' meaning 'throw') is also related to 'ballet', 'ballistics', and 'symbol'. In a semantic sense, it is also related even to 'promise' insofar as that comes from the same meaning in Latin 'pro-' and 'mittere' (to send; throw) or in other words something that was sent out beforehand.
2215: Periphrastic Utility Jan 7, 2021
To update slightly the post on periphrasis from 2018, there can be linguistically significant benefits of using seemingly unnecessary words beyond just style. To recap, periphrastic language is when one uses separate words to express a grammatical relationship, such as 'did go' rather than 'went'. These are often, though by no means always with auxiliary verbs, but consider the exception with "I was blamed" with "I received the blame", which affects the grammar beyond simply intensity. Yiddish also uses periphrasis to express speed or urgency such as כאפן א קוק (khop a kuk), literally 'catch a look', or טאן א קוק (ton a kuk), literally 'do a look' meaning 'looked'.
2214: Delexical or 'Light' Verbs Jan 6, 2021
There are plenty of verbs that people use that are at best semantically incomplete, such as 'take' in "to take a bath" or "to take a test". These and many others are known as light verbs, delexical verbs, or vector verbs. These verbs essentially exist as they are used to complement an object, which is usually a noun. 'Do' and 'have' can fit into this category, but this usage should not be thought of as auxiliary, as the function of indicating grammatical aspect is different.
2210: Are Raise-Rise & Lay-Lie the Same Word? Jan 2, 2021
Ostensibly, the words 'rise' and 'lie' are very syntactically similar. Rare for most verb in English, they both modify apophonically (i.e. with internal vowel changes) to indicate transitivity (i.e. whether the verb takes an object). For instance, all in the present tense:
I raise something up // I rise (*something) up
I lay something down // I lie (*something) down
the latter forms of each being impossible in English. These 4 forms are often considered different words altogether rather than 2, in part because they conjugate differently, past tense perfect:
raise-raised; rise-rose; lay-lain; lie-lay.
Note also that while the intensive form 'arise' exists, there is no 'araise', nor for that matter intensive 'alay' nor 'alie'). While these are therefore almost certainly separate, apophany indicates multiple functions and not only tense or pluralization, so it is not so clear cut. If there is another word you know that indicates transitivity; there are some.
2192: Plurals that aren't Plural Dec 15, 2020
This is the final post of Pluralization Week. To see the whole collection together, visit this collection.
Notional agreement, also discussed under the broader label of synesis, is a phenomenon in which a grammatical construction will take on number or gender when relevant, which is not strictly grammatical, but which is otherwise implicit from the concept. For instance, in English plurals are often treated as singular or vice versa depending on how it is considered. Take for instance the seemingly contradictory grammar:
The British government are divided.
Great Britain is a wealthy nation.
This is especially common when there is something that distances the subject from the verb, such as:
*The number of people moving to big cities are increasing
*Five hundred dollars is a lot of money
2189: Massive and Numerative Plurals Dec 12, 2020
While some languages distinguish between paucal (unknown few) and greater plurals (unknown many), others have a massive plural and a numerative plural. To illustrate the difference—though keep in mind this does not exist in English—a massive plural implies indivisibility, such as using pluralization to discuss the "waters of the Indian Ocean". Of course in that example using ‘waters’ is not strictly necessary anyway so consider also that English distinguishes between ‘fish’ [singular], ‘fish’ [like a collective plural] and ‘fishes’ [like a divisible plural] i.e. ‘types of fish’. Languages that morphologically distinguish between massive plural and a numerative plural (unlike English) don’t necessarily have both, such as Welsh which has a separate singular, plural, and massive (collective) plural but not numerative per se. Because English has no productive way to distinguish mass nouns morphology, ostensibly singular nouns like ‘sand’ need to be disambiguated with whole phrases, in this case ‘grain of sand’. Slavic and Semitic languages etc. also distinguish certain qualities of massive plurals.
2172: try and trial Nov 25, 2020
Although it is a bit more old fashioned, the structure of "try and" rather than "try to" was seen to be more proper. Indeed, when considering the etymology of this word, it makes more sense. Though clearly the definition has shifted slightly, it originally meant 'test' or 'examine'. Notably, this developed basically oppositely to 'prove', which is now taken to mean 'establish(ed) through testing', but originally meant what 'try' means now. It is through this more formal sense of 'examination' rather than merely 'attempt' that the word 'trial' came to be.
2127: Empathetic vs. Empathic Oct 11, 2020
There are two variants, 'empathetic' and 'empathic' which people use for more or less the same purpose. There are some regional differences certainly, but the more commonly used and the more generally accepted is 'empathic'. Due to the relation with 'sympathetic' however, there has been a gradual rise also of the word 'empathetic', especially in less formal contexts, which would follow a similar pattern ostensibly.
2116: Fluids vs. Liquids Sep 30, 2020
When people say during the summer to take a lot of fluids, there's a good chance this relates to hydration. This isn't a problem per se, because liquids are fluids, but the two are not directly synonymous. Fluids can denote anything which doesn't hold its shape and does not resist external pressure, which also includes gasses but not some pastes or really thick syrups for instance. In general use, it will most likely be understood to mean just the thinner liquids.