2406: "For To" Infinitives Jul 21, 2021
There is a non-standard infinitive construction—"for to" as opposed to merely "to"—originating in Northern Ireland, which is used interchangeably with a standard infinitive marker but is particularly used to indicate a purpose clause. This made its way over to North America and in particular the American South which was dominantly settled by Irishmen, Scottsmen, and Welshmen. For instance, in the song Oh! Susanna:
"I'm going to Louisiana / My true love for to see."
This is actually even less standard than its normal use which might look more like, "I want for to meet them" since in that way this can be seen as a variant of other purpose clauses in Standard English which might appear like "I want for Bob to meet them". The difference is that the subject of the main clause (preceded by a small clause) takes the preposition 'for' to mark purpose, whereas in the "for to" example, the subject of the main clause and the small clause are the same.
2405: Shell Group Name Jul 20, 2021
The name for the Shell Corporation, officially Royal Dutch Shell Group, does not have so much relation between the products its involved with and the symbol. It was in the 19th century, however, a merger of two companies: Royal Dutch Petroleum and The Shell Transport & Trading Co.. The latter company which dealt with trading goods from East Asia actually did transport shells, among other goods.
2404: @ in Hebrew and German Jul 19, 2021
The modern Hebrew word for the @ symbol is שטרודל (strudel), as in the German dessert. This is coincidental that both the pastry and the symbol are from the same name, but in German, and also Yiddish whence the Hebrew derives, this literally means 'whirlpool' and is supposed to be reminiscent of something twisting and spinning. In German, the word for the @ symbol is 'der Klammeraffe' which means 'spider monkey', though 'Klammer' on its own does not mean 'spider' but rather 'bracket'.
2403: date (palm) Jul 18, 2021
Palm trees are named for palms because of their resemblance to fingers. Less abstractly then, the date fruit may have been named fingers too. The English name is from the Greek δάκτυλος (dáktylos) meaning 'finger' as in 'polydactyl' or 'pterodactyl'. Some say this is from the fruit itself while others say it is also for the palm leaves, like the whole tree itself. Another theory gives this a Semitic root linking it to the same root as the Hebrew דקל (dekel) and that δάκτυλος (dáktylos) was only later associated by folk-etymology.
2402: palm Jul 17, 2021
The word for the palm of one's hand and palm of palm trees are from the same root, but while these trees do not grow in Northern Europe, this pattern is common pattern across Germanic languages. The trees are named for the way the fronds fan out like fingers—though notably then these are not finger-trees—but the concept was imported due to Christian biblical imagery. Phrases like 'palm-sunnandæg' in Old English here or also Old Norse existed, but technically this was via Latin 'palma' (palm tree).
2401: Russian Continents Jul 16, 2021
It's well known that the Spanish speaking world regard the landmasses of North and South America as one continent, simply the Americas. In this way those people regard the world with 6 continents, but it could go even fewer. The Russians and Japanese distinguish between two Americas, but regard Eurasia as one continent. This makes sense for Russia especially which straddles both with wide margins. That's still just 6, and while some academics discuss the idea of 5 or even only 4—Afro-Eurasia, Americas, Antarctica, Oceania—this is not a major movement.
2400: chattel & cattle Jul 15, 2021
While the word 'chattel' is fairly unremarkable in its etymology, its history is enlightening. Unsurprisingly, it is related to the word 'cattle' and 'capital' in the sense of 'head'. The sense of any property goods, as opposed to real estate, was well established by the Middle Ages, certainly with some association to the meaning of 'cattle'. It was in the mid-17th century took on specific associations with slavery, and many abolitionists took the word with a new political meaning in their writings to emotional impact.
2399: Hebrew's Relationship to Chicken Jul 14, 2021
Technically, Hebrew has a distinct word for 'chicken' which is תרנגולת (tarnigolet) but this really only refers to a live chicken, specifically a hen. The word עוף (óf) is used for when referring to the meat, but this is also another word more generally meaning 'bird'. This is still the generic term for any bird in Modern Hebrew, and itself is related from the לעוף (la'uf) meaning 'to fly' but over time it gained another connotation. As it happens Israel is the number 1 consumer of chicken per capita globally, so perhaps this is not without reason.
2398: pomegranate Jul 13, 2021
Pomegranate is pretty clearly involving the root of the French 'pomme' (Latin 'pomum') meaning 'apple' or more accurately 'fruit' but it is less clear about the second element. Some say this is from the Latin 'granatum' meaning 'seeds' from the root of *gre-no- (grain) but this is not the only theory. Part of the difficulty there is that the word used to be 'poumgarnet' and the '-gra-' came to be through metathesis, so to go on this etymology which does certainly have some historic backing would require two rounds of metathesis on the same term. Still, names including the Latin 'mālum grānātum' (seeded apple) and mālum Punicum (Punic apple) are attested historically, so this may just be so. The scientific name is Punica granatum, in line somewhat with the Roman naming.
2397: Naming of the First World War Jul 12, 2012
The First World War may have sounded a pessimistic name for those who would not predict a second, but in 1920 there was a book named as such. In fact, while many at the time called it The Great War, this had previously referred to the Napoleonic War, and realizing this nature of forgetting and renaming wars, The First World War, 1914-1918 by Charles à Court Repington was titled for people of future generations.
2396: Countries without Long-Form Names Jul 11, 2021
Most countries have an official long-form name such as 'Venezuela' and 'The Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela', 'Micronesia' to the 'Federated States of Micronesia', and 'Luxembourg' to 'Grand Duchy of Luxembourg'. Indeed, countries like Japan, Hungary, Tuvalu, and Ireland are some of the few countries with no distinctions between common names and official names, sort of. In the case of Japan, the official name is Nippon, even in English, but this is very rarely used and since it is simply the endonym rather than an expanded name this is not considered to be long-form. Conversely, Ireland is often referred to as the Republic of Ireland, especially to disambiguate this with Northern Ireland or the island as a whole, despite the fact that this is not officially used by the country itself. Some others like Hungary used to have official long-forms but removed them, as in that case in 2012.
2395: Odd Soviet Names Jul 10, 2021
Russian names, especially during the Soviet era can reflect a lot about the culture. For instance, электростанция (elektrostantsiya) and индустриализация (industrializatsiya) meaning 'power-station' and 'industrialization' respectively were (and to a lesser extent still are) girls' names. Others existed like 'Vilen' as an acronym of (V)ladimir (I)lyich (Len)in. Much of the time this was to show one's dedication to the Communist Party, and many last names in this style were taken as well.
2394: Verrazzano & Verrazano Jul 9, 2021
Plenty of things around New York are named for Giovanni da Verrazzano. Many of these if not all however are mispelt. It is not entirely clear as to how things ended up this way, but major construction projects such as the Verrazano Bridge are only spelt with one Z. Likewise, the Maryland's Verrazano Bridge has this same error.
2393: whale Jul 8, 2021
The word 'whale' has its origins even in idioms and phrases of Old English, the concept used to be more generic. First off, the Old English could refer to a walrus, which is a compound once meaning 'whale-horse' in Dutch, or 'horschwæl' in Old English. This word was also part of many kennings like 'hron-rād' ('whale-road'). Likewise, this root historically just referred to any large sea-animal, such as the Latin 'squalus' denoting anything big in the sea. Indeed this idea carried on into modern phrases like 'whale of a time' which just means 'big; grand'.
2392: New Angoulême Jul 7, 2021
Old New York was once New Amsterdam, but before then even it was known as New Angoulême. While officially taken by a French voyage, the man who commanded the ship was Italian. Still, he wished to curry favor with the French king and Giovanni da Verrazzano named it after the place the king was born. In fact, Francis I was from the house of Valois, but of those there were 3 dynasties: the House of Valois, Valois-Orléans, Valois-Angoulême, the latter of which King, Francis I was the first monarch.
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: Traboules and Snickelways Jul 5, 2021
While terms for common architectural and city-planning phenomena do not tend toward regionality, there are some exceptions. For instance, the French city of Lyon is famous for what are known as a 'traboule', which literally means like 'crossway' but refers to a city-specific system of passageways and alleys that often cross into private property, and were once used to move silks to the river to be sold when it was given a near monopoly on the French silk trade. Likewise, the city of York is famous for its so-called 'snickelways', a term derived for its narrow, winding alleys coined in the 1980's. These are only a couple examples of city-specific terminology, partly because of the unique way that they sprang into being, but many other cities have similar reasons for their own unique, or at least particular terms.
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.