2391: ululate, howl, & owl Jul 6, 2021
There are umpteen synonyms out there with formal-informal distinctions, like the words 'ask' and 'question' or even 'interrogate', but in the case of 'howling' and 'ululation', these are distant cognates. Both of these are traced back to the Proto-Indo-European *u(wa)l- meaning and leading to 'wail'. Plenty of words come from this, including 'owl', so called for the screeches it makes. Indeed, a number of languages around Europe have this same pattern of owls and howling being connected etymologically, though of course there are many birds named for their sounds, most obviously perhaps being the cuckoo.
2390: family Jul 4, 2021
Family is not a choice, and neither is slavery. In Latin, 'familia'—the source of many derivatives in languages around the world—most specifically referred to the domestics of one house or estate, and this would include relatives but also servants. An earlier 'famulus' exists as a word for 'servant' or 'slave'. For the sense of family across generations it was more common in fact to use the word 'domus', which has its own very interesting set of derivatives in English. The English word 'family' also referred to the household staff even into the 16th century, though by the 17th the word came to mean 'parents with their children'. This replaced the Old Enlgish 'hiwscipe' which had a similarly broad meaning as well as 'ham' (as in 'hamlet') leading to the word 'home' but originally meaning 'village'.
2389: Eritrea & Eretria Jul 3, 2021
Eritrea is a country, and Eretria is a Greek city. These are not as connected as one might falsely conclude however, even though the country 'Eritrea' gets its name from Greek, specifically Ἐρυθρὰ Θάλασσα (Erythra Thalassa) meaning 'Red Sea'. This name was given over by the Italians who colonized the land in 1890, but even when it was under the British or later Ethiopian control the name was retained. The nation has a number of different linguistic groups with no official language either from which to take another name. The Greek city is named Ερέτρια from the word ἐρέτης, (erétēs) meaning 'rower', giving the city the name translating as 'city of rowers'.
2388: How the Vitamins got their Names Jul 2, 2021
While the need for vitamins is a basic one, the naming of them is only misleadingly basic. Vitamins A, B, C, D, and E are all named simply in order of their discovery, starting in 1912. After this however, the list skips right to K, which has its name for two reason. On the one hand, mainly this is because it was what was available, though now F-J have all been renamed, either as mere variants of other vitamins—particularly of vitamin B—or were false discoveries. Others have suggested this is from the German word 'koagulation' since it was discovered in Germany and helps with blood coagulation. Even if this is true, it is not as relevant as the first reason though. Other anomalies include a lack of vitamin N, Q, R, or T despite there being vitamins P, S, and U.
2384: felon Jun 28, 2021
While no one should want to be called a felon, it used to have certain additional bad connotations in the past. In Old French 'felon' could mean any sort of 'evil-doer' both in a legal sense including treachery or oath-breaking, but also generally being a scoundrel in the traditional sense. One theory as to where it originates beyond that point is with the Frankish '*fillo' meaning 'scourge', or the Latin fel (poison) while others point to the Latin 'fellare' meaning 'to suck'. Beyond this, it is especially unclear if this was of Romantic or Germanic origins.
2381: camp Jun 25, 2021
The word 'camp' relating to an open field for lodging is not so surprisingly the same as would be found with 'campus', but neither of these have the explicitly militaristic use that was once seen. While French for instance also has the word 'champ' (field), the root in Latin and then Old English had the sense of "contest; battle" hence phrases like 'camp-fever'. This is also related to the Old High German 'hamf' (paralyzed; maimed). Even in the 19th century, when the word 'camp' had moved on from militaristic senses, it took on religious ones as in 'followers of a doctrine', a sense still seen in reference to ideological battle, including secular academic ones. The sense of 'camp' as a hobby or sporting activity was developed from its use for military but it by a historical framework relatively new.
2377: moustache, mandible, & kemp Jun 21, 2021
The word 'mustache' (or 'moustache') has been the word for the hair above the upper-lip since the 16th century, from French but ultimately the Ancient Greek μύσταξ (mústax) meaning 'upper lip'. This in turn is from the root *mendʰ- (to chew) thereby connecting this word to 'mandible': an animal's jaw bone, as well as the French 'manger' (to eat). Before this, English used the word 'kemp'—itself related to 'chin' and more surprisingly, 'camp'. In Middle English, 'kempe' referred to coarse hairs but is not related to other words like 'comb' or 'unkempt'.
2376: boot-camp Jun 20, 2021
The phrase 'boot-camp' can refer to any intense, introductory training course, especially in military contexts. This should come as no surprise therefore that this originated as military slang in the 1940's with the 'boot' in question itself being slang for a new recruit. In particular this was naval slang, and can be attested as far back as the Spanish-American War, with the naval uniform not consisting of boots per se, but of leggings.
2374: nachos Jun 18, 2021
There's an old joke:
What do you call cheese that doesn't belong to you?
Nacho cheese. (This really only works if you say it out loud...)
For Ignacio Anaya however, this would be false. Nachos were actually named after a specific person, Ignacio Anaya, a Mexican restaurateur who owned Nacho's Restaurant and named the dish after himself too. Nacho happens to be a fairly common nicknamed form of the Spanish name Ignacio. This was originally the Latin 'Ignatius', famed for the saint Ignatius of Antioch, with Ignatius technically being a name in English but far less common than its Spanish equivalent.
2371: mortimer Jun 15, 2021
The surname and later first name 'Mortimer' (hence 'Morty') is originally French for 'dead sea'. This habitational surname however is subject to a folk etymology that this comes from the time when a French speaking class ruled over the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem (1099–1291) as one of the crusader states. The Dead Sea at the end of the Jordan River is certainly more famous, but not the dead sea in question, which is actually Mortemer, Seine-Maritime, Normandy, in France. This was the site of the Battle of Mortemer in 1054 fought in this area known for its stagnant water.
2366: Names with 'St.' not Named for Saints. Jun 10, 2021
There are places around the UK place names with 'St.' included in it which are not named after any saints. For instance, in Cornwall 'St Dennis' is not actually named after the martyr Denis of Paris but as a misinterpretation of the Cornish 'dinas' (hill-fort). The 'St.' was added later. Likewise, the Cornish village of St Agnes was not named for Agnes of Rome but in this case this is not from Cornish but from Old Norse, namely as a compound from 'hagi' (pasture) and 'nes' (headland). This is particularly notable because Cornwall is about as far from the Danelaw as one can get in England, but there are certain names influenced from Old Norse.
2363: Albatross: Spanish & Arabic Borrowing from Themselves Jun 7, 2021
As seen in the name of 'Alcatraz', the word has been associated with both pelicans and gannets due to related sounding Arabic and Spanish words, but that doesn't end there. The word 'albatross' (in Spanish 'albatros') is 'alcatraz' in Portuguese. Certainly the association of different sea-birds under one name isn't unique and probably from the same Arabic word which led to the archaic Spanish name for a pelican. It also could be from another Arabic word الْقَادُوس (al-qādūs), itself from the Ancient Greek κάδος (kádos) meaning 'jar'. In any case, it's thought to be influenced by the Latin 'albus' (white). As if all this back-and-forth lending wasn't complicated enough, the Modern Arabic for 'albatross' قَطْرَس (qaṭras) is not only not the origin here but may have been borrowed from the Modern Spanish.
2362: Alcatraz: Named after which Bird? Jun 6, 2021
The island of Alcatraz is known for many things including as a prison, the site of a major Native American protest, and a museum, it was also known for its pelicans, sort of. Many people mistakenly believe this is where the name comes from, but the Spanish "La Isla de los Alcatraces" does not mean as many think "The Island of the Pelicans" but instead "The Island of the Gannets". Anyway, the Spanish for 'pelicans' is 'pelícanos' but there is an archaic Spanish word 'alcatraz' (pelican) from the Arabic: غطاس (al-ġaţţās) meaning 'the diver; the submerger'. It is from these gannets that the island took its name in 1775. More on this in a separate post.
2360: gander (v), gannet, & goose Jun 4, 2021
The verbal form of 'gander' is probably used more often than the nominal form, but it is newer and originates as slang. Specifically inmate slang, since a gander is a male goose and in this case was noted for the long, bending neck. The word 'gannet', another type of waterfowl comes from the exact same Proto-Indo-European root. This helps to support the argument that the earlier sense of this word was simply seabird as in other languages this root led to the names for other types of birds like the Lithuanian 'gandras' (stork).
2359: fellow Jun 3, 2021
The word 'fellow' has both casual and general connotations as would 'guy' but can also convey some level of union and equality, not to mention its use for academia and professional endeavors. It is from the original notion of a peer in a union that the other meanings arise. In fact, the original meaning was of a partnership but specifically one of joint properties from the Germanic word 'félag’ via Old Norse. This itself is from 'fé' (livestock) and 'lag' (cohabitation; guild) and these roots also led to 'fee' and 'law' eventually, the latter initially just the plural form of 'lag'.
2358: pollen Jun 2, 2021
The word 'pollen' is part of plant reproduction, but that's not exactly the original sense of the root. In Latin, this meant 'flour' to refer to its fine powdery quality. Even when modern taxonomic categories came into effect in the Modern Age, Linnaeus kept the term and used it to describe spores. From then on it the word stuck in an official capacity.
2354: gamut May 29, 2021
'Gamut' referring to the whole range of something originates with music. In fact, this really began as a phrase, from the medieval Latin 'gamma ut' with that being the lowest note on a G scale. This is from the Greek Γ (gamma) originally denoting the last a medieval scale in a hexachord—gamma appears 6th in Greek's alphabet—which was associated with the sound 'ut' in solfège i.e. ut, re, mi, fa.... Eventually this was applied to other scales with more notes and then ranges of anything.
2352: Virginia Named after Elizabeth May 27, 2021
The US state of Virginia (technically a commonwealth) is name for the British monarchy of its time, as with the colonial settlement of Jamestown within. The commonwealth however is named after Queen Elizabeth and isn’t ‘Elizabethia’. Rather this is because she was known as the Virgin Queen. Some have also suggested that this comes from native names like 'Wingandacoa' or the name 'Wingina' but the problem with this is that the name of the commonwealth originally applied to basically all of British America including as far north as Maine, as far south as parts of the Caribbean those these eventually came to have their own designations. Indeed, other queens have had monikers like Elizabeth, the Queen Mother: wife to George VI, though this is confusingly also used to refer to Queen Elizabeth II, her daughter.
2351: crane & grouse May 26, 2021
The word for a crane in Latin is ‘grus’. In fact, despite the apparent differences these names for the lanky bird are actually cognates, sharing an older root found in many indo-european languages. One might think that the bird known as ‘grouse’—a lot more similar in sound—would be related but it probably has no connection to the Latin ‘grus’. Before it went by its modern name, the grouse was called a 'moorhen', though now this term usually applies to a small, black water-fowl related to the coot.
2350: pedigree May 25, 2021
The word 'pedigree' these days refers to record of lineage of a purebred animal such as for dogs, but this word originated with birds' feet. The word is actually from a French phrase 'pé de grue' (today 'pied de gru') meaning 'crane-foot'. This had nothing to do with actually bird lineage per se, but instead with keeping paper records of animal ancestors with each generation splitting along forked paths resembling a crane's foot. The reason for referencing cranes in particular is probably just that these were quite common across England and France at the time.