2484: Irreversible Binomials Sep 30, 2021
A so-called irreversible binomial is a phrase which exists with separable words that occur in a fixed order, like 'fish and chips', 'fight or flight, 'or 'short and sweet'. These can exists for all types of words, including for those which are no longer productive, like 'kit and caboodle' or 'vim and vigor'. This leads to come pairs like 'time and time again' abbreviated as 'time and again' which would make 'again' sound like a noun and is ungrammatical, but here there is no loss in meaning. Many of these near-idiomatic phrases are also somewhat poetic in their structure, relying on rhymes or alliteration frequently. These nearly always use a conjunction either 'and' or 'or', but in some cases exceptional like 'hoity toity' this is not necessary.
2483: siamese twins Sep 29, 2021
The term 'siamese twins' is becoming less popular compared to 'conjoined twins', because of perceived racial connotations. Indeed, Thailand isn't even called Siam anymore. The term was originally coined after Chang and Eng Bunker, two famous conjoined twins from Thailand living in the former half of the 19th century. They toured the world for many years, especially the USA, becoming quite famous both in the medical community and wider culture. This term 'siamese twins' is even used in astrophysics to describe two galaxies that appear to be close to conjoined, though these days many do not like to use this term
2477: Scotch Bonnet Sep 23, 2021
The Scotts are not known particularly for their spicy foods, and yet there is a hot, caribbean pepper named the Scotch bonnet. This is not because it has any particular relation to Scotland, but because of its supposedly similar resemblance to the tam o'shanter hat (also known as toorie bunnet): a round, woolen cap with a pom-pom. This name itself comes from the name of the hero in a poem by Robert Burns, perhaps the most famous writer in Scottish history.
2475: Asyndeton Sep 21, 2021
Asyndeton is a literary device of removing conjunctions between related clauses, such as the famous Latin line 'veni; vidi; vici' (I came; I saw; I conquered). These can be on the level of whole phrases and clauses, as in the example before, or merely a series of adjuncts "softly, carefully, she walked down the stairs" or other sorts of features just so long as the conjuncts have no conjunction. This literary device helps to add emphasis, memorability and a certain smoothness to the language.
2471: lemon & citrus Sep 17, 2021
Around Europe, two different basic terms for 'lemon', or alternatively 'citron' are used, both very likely of Semitic origin though this is not certain. Ultimately, 'lemon', also found in Portuguese 'limão' and Spanish 'limón', along with a number of other Semitic and Nilo-Saharan languages comes from Arabic لَيْمُون (laymūn), itself from Persian and likely with a connection to the Sanskrit word for 'lime'. 'Citron' on the other hand, as in the French 'citron', German 'Zitron', or Italian 'cedro' is via the Latin 'citrus' from Greek, likely from a Mediterranean, pre-Greek root akin to the Arabic قَطْرَان (qaṭrān), which may have been used to describe the resins and only later the fruit itself. More on how limes fit into the story tomorrow.
2470: Codex & Affix: Why Different Plurals? Sep 16, 2021
The plural of 'index' is 'indices' and likewise with 'codex' to 'codices', but the plural of 'affix' is 'affixes'. This is not in fact inconsistent, but a result of the way in which English borrows words from Latin. In the case of 'codex', this is a Latin word in the 3rd declension which had a Latin plural of 'codices'. Strictly speaking, the plural is simply '-ēs' but the 'x' is assimilated along with the vowel as seen in the rest of the forms including the genitive singular 'cōdicis'. In the case of 'affix', this is formed from the prefix 'ad-' (toward) and 'fixus', which is the participial form of the verb 'figere' meaning 'to fasten', as in 'join together'. Since English generally does not take the 2nd declension '-us-' ending, 'affixus' (the -d- was assimilated) becomes mere 'affix'.
2468: forest Sep 14, 2021
'Forest' is a word with cognates in both Germanic and Romance languages, but few with meanings like in English. Originally, the phrase was from Late Latin phrase 'forestis silva' (the outside woods) as a term to distinguish the royal forests, also called a 'park' (parcus). The actual Latin word 'silva' was misunderstood and they took 'forestis'. This replaced 'weald' in Old English (related to 'wald' in German), 'scough', originally Old Norse 'skógr', and Middle English 'firth'.
2467: steward, constable, & marshal Sep 13, 2021
'Steward' and 'constable' are not related, but with somewhat convergent meaning from a definitions which would now be virtually unrecognizable that were equally similar in the past. The 'ste-' of 'steward' is from the same root as 'sty' as in 'pigsty' and '-stable of 'constable also became 'stable', as in where livestock live. Therefore, a steward was the ward (i.e. guard) of a sty, and a constable was the guard of a stables. The meaning of 'steward' as general manager of estates or ships etc. came much later, both from natural development and especially from confusion on translation of French terms after the Conquest of 1066. 'Constable' totally synonymous with 'steward' for a time, though eventually these affairs constables oversaw became increasingly, later exclusively legal in nature, hence its meaning as police officer. Likewise, 'marshal' went through a quite similar transformation, from 'mare-shalk' (i.e. 'horse guard') to a general official title related to law enforcement, though this historical change happened from French.
2466: county Sep 12, 2021
Counties are named because they were ruled by counts, but at least in England, not to mention other places, these could have been ruled by other types of people, including earls, lords, dukes, etc.. Before this, the Old English used 'scir', an ancestor of the Modern English 'shire'. Moreover, 'count' comes from Old French which was meant to be a translation of 'earl' (O.E.: 'eorl') but 'count' was primarily used as a term for foreign leaders in particular.
2465: lamb & yean Sep 9, 2021
Old English had the word 'ēanian' (now 'yean') for 'to lamb' as a verb, but 'lamb' is an Old English word anyway too. This disparity comes from two different roots, but the verbal form is related to many Romantic or Slavic nouns like the Latin 'agnus' (lamb) or Serbo-Croatian ја̏гње (jȁgnje). 'Lamb' on the other hand is mostly related to modern Germanic cognates, and even the English 'elk'. These both come from different Proto-Indo-European roots that converged into the same meaning, and in some languages one became dominant. By the Middle Ages, 'lamb' won out in English.
2450: Hebrew סלמון: Overproduced [l] Sound Aug 26, 2021
The Hebrew סלמון [salmon] is directly taken from the English, including the now-not-silent [l]. What makes this even more remarkable is that there was never a point in English the L was pronounced in 'salmon' and in Middle English the word was 'samoun'; before this the Old English 'leax' (related to ‘lox‘) was used. The L was added in association with the original Latin root, but it's unclear where this comes from. This process of adding traditional but unproductive letters from Latin was pretty common, as in 'indict' or 'island'.
2449: Peppercorn Rent Aug 25, 2021
Peppercorn rent refers to rent that is given as a token. Plenty of examples of this ceremonial, notional rent can be found where it is legally or contractually necessary to pay a certain amount of money that is effectively irrelevant, like buying an entire business for a dollar so some sale can be recorded. While this term is now usually just suggestive of something nominally worthless, in the past this was not totally unheard of, and certain places like the University of Bath pays the city rent in the form of a peppercorn, though now this is just symbolic of tradition.
2448: bankrupt Aug 24, 2021
'Bankrupt' is a compound word, and yet its latter element, '-rupt' holds no meaning. This on its own isn't rare, but it comes from an Italian figure of speech which itself is not a compound. Admittedly, were it a word '-rupt' could be just be thought of as related to 'rupture' and that would stand, coming from the same root ultimately, but the Italian 'banca rotta' (broken bench) figuratively refers to a bank that has gone out of business, that the bench was smashed. The terms 'bank' and 'bench' are related also in English with the common meaning as a place where things are deposited (including sand of a riverbank) and the benches of a bank were not actually smashed, at least not regularly to indicate business failure.
2444: garbage Aug 20, 2021
The '-age' suffix forms nouns indicating the action of a verb it modifies (i.e. 'leverage' or 'package') or aggregates as in 'mileage' or 'percentage'. That of the word 'garbage' does not fit neatly into one of those categories. It is not entirely clear where this word even comes from, but it is akin to the Old English 'ġearwian' meaning 'to make ready' or 'adorn' leading also to 'gear', and 'garb' as in clothes. This relation, also extended to Old French 'garber' (to refine; to neaten), eventually lead to its sense as kitchen scraps, especially of bits trimmed off meat. It is also probably related to or even influenced by 'garble' which used to only mean 'remove dirt/waste from spices'.
2443: Georgian's Backward Familial Terms: დედა and მამა Aug 19, 2021
In Georgian, mother is დედა (dada) and 'father' is მამა (mama). These sounds are fairly standard for what parents are called, but swapped as it is usual to see a nasal consonant for mothers. This pretty exceptional case is not that all the rest have some particular etymology, but it is understood the nasal vowels are easier to produce while nursing hence the association with mothers, and for fathers, words with either [p] or [d] at the beginning are normal, as these will likely be the first non-nasal consonants an infant will utter in general. This is found around the world, but one of a handful of deviations to those rules happens in Georgian to deviate from both rules.
2431: cant Aug 17
'Cant' can refer to any whining, empty, or hypocritical speech, or jargon of criminals in particular. It comes from the Latin 'cantāre' (to sing) also leading to English's 'chant', 'cantor' etc.. This switch from referring to a song to referring to this basically unwanted speech due to 'cant' having mostly religious connotations. It was associated strongly with beggars and eventually to a lesser extent with hypocritical religious singing, or at least that done without emotion and thought behind it. Even in the 17th century it was noted for slang for undesirable, later criminal language.
2430: interest Aug 16, 2021
The original sense of the Latin word for 'interest', 'interesse', meant 'to be important'. This sense was not gotten from the Old French 'interest' though, even though this is exactly the same root, because at the point English took from French it meant 'damage; loss', and it was at this point the -t was added to the other English word. The early meaning having a share in ownership. It is not clear how this sense transferred to its current meaning of money to pay back on top of repaying a loan. The financial senses were cemented by the 16th and 17th centuries considering certain connotations, but the emotional sense was a little earlier.
2429: kidnap Aug 15, 2021
When kids nap, that's usually a good thing, but when kids are napped it's a cause for terror. This apparent discrepancy is pretty much accidental though, but not as random a compound as, say, 'butterfly'. The '-nap' in question is simply a variant of 'nab' as in 'take', but the 'kid' is not random either. While this term now is also used for the abduction of adults and children alike, in the 17th century a 'kidnapper' abducted children for servitude, often as laborers in the Americas.
2425: Cakes and Existing: wastel, victual, & gâteau Aug 11, 2021
The French cake 'gâteau' and the far more obscure English word 'wastel' also meaning 'cake' both happen then to be from a root meaning 'to be'. This relation between pastries and existing did not originate with desserts, but with the idea of sustenance. It was in this sense of general food that came out of the Proto-Indo-European *wes- (to be). In the interim period as well, the Old English 'wist' (to exist) and Latin 'victus' hence English 'victual' meaning 'food; sustenance' related also to 'vital' show that this process was not taken exactly at the same time around the world.
2422: orca, killer whale, and grampus Aug 8, 2021
Killer whales named because they are whale killers. This observation was made even in ancient times, and among their multiple, varied names, the Spanish 'ballena asesina' literally means 'whale murderess' (it is grammatically feminine), since sailors noted that they would hunt in packs to kill whales. Both English and Spanish also use the alternative 'orca' from Latin but this isn't much less fearsome. This name comes from mythology of the underworld, and the Roman deity 'Orcus', also the namesake of ogres and orcs. Thus, the scientific name 'Orcinus orca' would translate as "orca [evil deity], of the kingdom of the underworld". Perhaps the nicest names are now mostly out of fashion, including grampus (literally 'fat-fish') and 'blackfish'.