Brobdingnagian

A word of Jonathan Swift's coinage, Brobdingnagian is an adjective derived from the country of Brobdingnag in the literary work Gulliver's Travels. The inhabitants of the land are giants, and so the adjectival form used in everyday (perhaps) vocabulary describes phenomena which are "immense; enormous" (AHD).

The spelling of the country, however, is a matter of some discussion.  In the preface to the 1735 edition of the work, Swift published a "letter" from Gulliver to "his cousin Sympson." This letter serves as something of a preface, with its chief purpose being to correct some egregious errors made in earlier printings. One such error is the spelling of "Brogdingrag (for so the Word should have been spelt, and not erroneously Brobdingnag)."

A critic, one John R. Clark, makes the claim that the rough translation of this word (whichever way one spells it, but at this time it seems Brobdingnag is more universally accepted) is "England." In the majority of the illustrations and maps invented for this country is the north western portion of the United States, even the entirety of the U.S.A. represented as Brobdingnag. It is thus interesting that England should be considered the non-fictional reality of the fictional country. (Not having Clark's book on hand I am unable to read his argument in its entirety.)

First Image Source: http://theverbistobe.files.wordpress.com/2008/07/bgiant.jpg

Second Image Source: http://www.lqart.org/illustfold/gulliver/gultrav.html

Information on the text: http://www.jaffebros.com/lee/gulliver/dict/b.html

shangri-la

"Shangri-La" is a great song by the Kinks (part of the British Invasion) that ironically points to leisure and material gain as a "paradise" to be aimed for; it is a critique of suburban life before it was fashionable to do so. That said, the term "Shangri-La" is actually credited to James Hilton, British author of the 1933 book Lost Horizon. In the book, the term is the name of a mystical, harmonious valley.

The OED defines it as a term used "to designate an earthly paradise, a place of retreat from the worries of modern civilization." "La" is the Tibetan term for "mountain pass" (OED), but "shangri" is undocumented in both the AHD and OED. The best hypothesis I have is that it is a British author's attempt to create a pseudo-Tibetan word. Wikipedia suggests that "shangri" comes from a Tibetan district called "shang," or that Hilton had heard the term "shambhala," the Tibetan equivalent of "shangri-la" in terms of definition, but could not remember the term.

Rutabaga

The rutabaga is "a European plant (Brassica napus var. napobrassica) having a thick edible bulbous root" or "the root of this plant" (AHD). This vegetable apparently got its English name from Old Norse through Swedish. The Swedish word "rotabagge" can be broken down into "rot," which means root, and "bagge," which means bag (AHD). Each of these components come from Old Norse words of the same meaning: "rot" comes from "rōt" and "bagge" comes from "baggi" (AHD). Etymologically speaking, then, rutabaga stands for root bag.

river

(a view of the Arkansas river, as seen from the pedestrian bridge at Murray Lock & Dam)

"The process of a living language is like the motion of a broad river which flows with a slow, silent, irresistible current." - Noah Webster

Our river comes from Old French rivere, also meaning "river." The Old French rivere can be traced back to Latin ripa, meaning "river-bank." I find it interesting that, etymologically speaking, the word emphasizes the banks of a river rather than the water flowing through the banks' channel. (The Latin word for "river" itself is flumen, and we can see the stem for "flow" in it.)

English has an adjective which can also be traced back to ripa: riparian, meaning "pertaining to river-banks." And the French Riviera is so called because the sea-shore can be referred to as one "bank" of the ocean.

sources: AHD and OED

Turkey

Turkey is a perplexing word; it means both "A large North American bird..." and "A country of SW Asia and SE Europe..." according to the AHD. Despite the turkey's undeniable connection to America (so great that Benjamin Franklin wished to make it the national bird), the bird does derive it's name from the same place as the country. It was confused with the somewhat similar guinea fowl, which was once believed to have originated in the Turkish lands. In reality the guinea fowl is native to Africa, meaning that not one, but two mistakes were involved in the naming of the bird: it was believed to be an entirely different bird, which was in turn believed to hail from an entirely locale!

The word Turkey has its root in the Old Turkik word "türk," meaning strong. The Turkik tribes who conquered modern-day Turkey (and many other areas) called themselves by this name.

butterfly

For a while I had myself convinced that butterfly had something to do with “flutter by,” as if the name came from a convenient twist of the descriptive phrase. The AHD states that the Middle English butterflye came from the Old English butorfleoge. The OED suggests comparing the Old English word (also spelled buttorfleoge, with two t’s) with the Dutch botervlieg, earlier botervlieghe. So what does the pretty bug have to do with butter? As the OED explains, “The reason of the name is unknown.” It references, however, a Dutch synonym boterschijte, “which suggests that the insect was so called from the appearance of its excrement.” This answer would be much less poetic and romantic than our idealized butterflies. To offer this word a saving grace, I turned back to the AHD definition: “any of various insdects of the order Lepidoptera.” I decided to look up Lepidoptera in the OED, and found that the name of the order is modern Latin, from the Greek λεπιδο- (lepido-, combining form of λεπις, “scale”) and pteron (πτέρον, “wing,” like in pterodactyl!). It seems as though the butterfly suffers from a less than flattering etymological history.

Prima Donna

Very few times in my life do I find myself so frustrated with a person that I label them a prima donna. (I also wonder if that word can be applied to men.) Also, I don't enjoy nor mean to use this word blog as a means to vent about life. Upon categorizing these people as such, I pondered upon the origins of prima donna.

The OED defines a prima donna as "the leading female singer in an opera company...of great skill and renown," "a person who has the highest standing or who takes a role in a particular community or field," and also as "a self-important or temperamental person." The AHD holds a similar definition, but adds "conceited" to the list of adjectives.

Etymologically, prima donna simply comes from the Italian prima (feminine of primo) , meaning "first", and donna, meaning "lady". Too simple of a history for my liking.

Emerald

So, I chose this word tonight/morning because in few days the newest edition to my family will be dubbed Emerald. To match her sister Diamond, of course. Although my sister did not ask my opinion on these unusual name choices I am secretly thrilled with them. I mean, I am their Aunt Crystal. :) So, to honor this little one I've decided to dissect her name. Strange way of honoring her I guess, but eh, such is life.
As most of you already know the word emerald is usually in reference to the stone. The OED defines it as:
" 1. A precious stone of bright green colour; in mod. use exclusively applied to a variety of the Beryl species (see BERYL n. 2), found chiefly in S. America, Siberia, and India."
Or:
"3. transf. as name of its colour; = emerald-green."
And, to my surprise, it can also be defined as:
" 4. Printing. The name of the size of type larger than nonpareil and smaller than minion."

This last one is definitely new to me. To keep things neat and simple I am going to use the AHD's etymological history of emerald. According to the AHD emerald originated in the Greek word smaragdos, then preceded to Latin in the form smaragdus (not much change there). It then progressed to Med. Lat. in esmeralda, esmeralus (which looks much closer to our word). From Med Lat it went on through OFr then to ME as emeraude. That's a bit complicated but I like that the word is founded in Greek. :) (The word diamond is rooted in Latin and crystal is from Greek, too. Just in case you were wondering.)

Coralline

The American Heritage Dictionary defines coralline as an adjective as "of, consisting of, or producing coral; resembling coral, esp. in color." The word can also be used as a noun meaning "any of various red algae of the family Corallinaceae whose fronds are covered with calcareous deposits; any of various organisms that resemble coral."

Coralline came to the English language from Latin as corallium, meaning coral. Late Latin changed the spelling to corallinus. From there it went through French as corallin before entering English as coralline.

The word coralline is most notable today with a different spelling, Coraline, from the Neil Gaiman story of the same name. Coraline is used as a name for the main character.

Source: AHD 4th Edition

Vanquish

As I vanquished the dark forces of Sauron tonight on the MUD I was playing (because text is the way to go, forget WoW), I noticed how much I love the word vanquish. To me it sounds very medieval, like it should be accompanied be thees and thous and all sorts of wonderful old language that we don't use anymore. A righteous word used for the thorough crushing of ones evil enemies. All hail the mighty conqueror! Ahem, anyways...

The AHD defines vanquish as a verb meaning:

1a. To defeat or conquer in battle; subjugate. b. To defeat in a contest, conflict, or competition.
2. To overcome or subdue (an emotion, for example); supress.

It comes through Middle English, vaynquisshen, and Old French, vainquir, vainquiss-, from the Latin verb vincere meaning to defeat or win. It's pretty much kept its meaning intact in its travels through the languages to our current English usage of the word.

Deluge (and a little bit of antediluvian)

I'm going to take a small vacation away from old sounding words to discuss a word that had a significant impact on my life recently. Last Friday, I went on a camping trip to help support my friends' Odyssey project. It was quite entertaining, and informative, as intended. Then, we were supposed to spend the night in tents or in makeshift shelters made from ropes and tarps.
I have no idea if it reached as far as Conway, but if you were in the Petit Jean area, you'll know that we chose the absolute worst time to attempt such a thing. As night fell, it was as though the skies themselves were rent asunder, and we found ourselves caught within a deluge of ice-cold water hammering upon our flimsy shelter with a force the likes of which could scour the Earth clean of its sins as the air above was burst and torn apart with volleys of unforgiving lightning and thunder, agents of nature sent to purge this world of the human taint once and for all. As we laid helpless, mewling like babes within our woefully inadequate protection, we were shown the true folly of our decision as our canvas failed against the depredations of wind and rain, and we were all caught in an azure wave the likes of which had not been seen since times antediluvian.

In summation, yeah, it rained a lot.

So, to pick one of the words from this list at random, all of which are appropriate, lets go with "deluge."

By the AHD, as a noun, deluge means a number of similar things: One meaning, appropriately for my tale, is "A great flood," or "Something that overwhelms as if by a great flood". It can also mean "A heavy downpour," which is also appropriate. It has one very specific meaning, however, from the Bible, meaning "the great flood that occurred in the time of Noah". This, too, is appropriate.

It's etymology is not overly complex. It comes from a Middle english word of the same spelling, which meant "flood." This word came from Old French, which in turn got it from the Latin word diluvium, a form of the word diluere, which means "to wash away." We also get dilute from this word. Diluere comes from dis-, meaning away or apart, and -luere, meaning "to wash". It is theorised that luere could come from leu()-, an Indo-European root meaning "wash".(AHD)

Also, as a side note, the word Antediluvian, the use of which will fufill my old word quota for this, comes from Ante-, before, and diluvian, which has the same stem as what has been discussed here. Literally, it means "Before the flood", and refers to something so old that it must have been around before the Biblical Flood of Noah.

Articulate

Two different meanings of this word in the OED caught my eye:

1) To formulate in an article or articles; to set out in articles; to particularize, specify.

2) To attach or unite (esp. a bone) by a joint; freq. with to, less commonly with. Usu. in pass.

The OED gives two different but similar explanations for the etymology of this word. It says that the "division into separate parts" comes from the Latin verb articula(-)t and the "unite" comes from the French verb articuler. As I understood, it brings it says the first meaning can be attributed to the verb form of our word, while the other meaning can be attributed to our adjective. I thought it interesting that one word could have seemingly opposite meanings. I also like the idea of something that breaks other things in to parts, in a way, also brings them together. I think I'm definately reading too much into it, but the word is more attractive that way.

Wax (v.) and Wane

This post is devoted to wax, the verb, not wax, the noun (the stuff that crayons and candles are made of). I've always wondered where we got the verb 'wax' from, so I decided to look it up.

The OED defines 'to wax' as "To grow, increase (as opposed to wane)" and gives us the following important information:

Originally a more frequent synonym of GROW v., which has now superseded it in general colloquial use, except with reference to the moon (see 6, which defines wax as "of the moon: to undergo the periodical increase in the extent of its visible illuminated portion, characteristic of the first half of the lunation"). With this exception, the senses below which are not marked as obsolete are confined to literary use, and have, in varying degrees, a somewhat archaic flavour; some of those under branch I survive only in the traditional antithesis with WANE v. The verb is said still to be current in certain dialects: see Eng. Dial. Dict.

It also tells us that wax v. was a common Teutonic strong verb, and that the Old English verb weaxan had numerous similar Germanic siblings.

Because we have noted the importance of wax v. in contrast to wane v., it should not be surprising,then, that wane means "to grow less, decrease (opposed to wax)" and is likewise a verb native to English, having numerous Germanic siblings which are quite similar to it in form.

Don't you find it rather interesting that people still will say the phrase "wax poetical" and yet we don't really say that someone "wanes poetical"? It's just interesting how certain words become petrified into sayings to the point that we still use them, though not as frequently as we used to.

All quotes and information are from the OED and the image is used from www.astronomycast.com.

Opposition

Opposition comes from the classical Latin opposit- meaning to set against and then is seen in Greek in the context of opposition of two celestial objects, but it actually came in from French, according to the OED. Today it has the definition of, "Senses relating to physical position." 

I thought that the word opposition with the meaning that is has, had to have had an interesting journey into English as it relates not only with physical position, but also conflict, which is why I chose this word. 

caterwaul

Words just like the ones you used –they mean nothing at all to you, but they caterwaul…
caterwaul… caterwaul… through my lonely hall.
I really like this word. I’ve wanted to post an entry on it ever since Amy’s Caterpillar entry reminded me of caterwaul’s curious and bewitching sonority.

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the definition of our use of the word’s verb form is:

To utter a similar cry [to cats in heat]; to make a discordant, hideous noise; to quarrel like cats.¹

Today we use the word primarily as a synonym for howl, but in the 17th and 18th centuries, the sexual connotations of comparing a person to a mating cat were also utilized, as this in this example from the OED article:

“She catter~wauls, and must have a stallion..she must and will marry again.”²

--even that questionable mental image couldn’t diminish my affinity for the word’s odd semi-onomatopoeia.

I say “semi-” because the -waul portion of the word is actually onomatopoetic; from Middle English wawlen or wrawlen, meaning “howl.”³ The root of wawlen is Old English wāwan, which refers to the sound of the blowing of the wind.⁴

And as Amy’s entry explains, “cater-” comes simply from the supposed Middle English root cater derived from Low German kater, meaning “tomcat.” It is also possible, however, that the word cater never existed in Middle English, and the -er- infix is just an arbitrary conjoining syllable.⁵

Whatever the case, I still think it’s a beautiful word.

---

¹“caterwaul”. Oxford English Dictionary. 2007. Oxford University Press. 29 March 2009. http://dictionary.oed.com/cgi/entry/50034602.
² Burton, Robert. The anatomy of melancholy. 1621.
³“caterwaul”. American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language. 4th Ed. Houghton Mifflin. 2000.
⁴”Caterwaul”. Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary. 2nd Ed. Random House Inc. 2006.
⁵Liberman, Anatoly and Mitchell, J. Lawrence. An Analytic Dictionary of English Etymology. Pg. 183. University of Minnesota Press. 2008.
*Photograph by Graeme Mitchell. "Dark Hall". http://www.dammasch.com/photo/graeme/large/dark_hall_large.jpg

Debonair(e)

This fanciful word is one of my favorites, as it sounds like its meaning; suave. It's just a fun thing to say, and also gives its speaker an excuse to use a Pepe le Pieu accent, which is always fun.

Its commonly used for the meaning "Suave" or "urbane", but other definitions of the word include;
1) Affable; genial
2) Carefree and gay; jaunty

The etymological history of the word comes from Latin de, of + bon, good + aire, nest, family. This Latin saying "de bon aire", meaning "of good lineage or disposition, then passed into Old French, which later became the Middle English word debonaire, meaning "gracious, kindly"

[All definitions/history from the AHD]

Salad

Tonight, I had to have a salad.  It wasn't a want at all-- my body just insisted!  So I mixed up some fresh Arkansas field greens, strawberries, blueberries, pecans, and goat cheese then topped it all with a balsamic vinaigrette. Salad is one of my most favorite foods to eat, so I decided to see where the word comes from for our blog.  

According to the American Heritage Dictionary, it ultimately from the past participle of the Latin verb sal, to salt, salare. This is because salt is a crucial ingredient in many salad dressings, and has been since the days of the Romans. The dish and word were passed along to Old French, and then to Middle English. The OED tells us that salad was first printed in 1390 in a cookbook called Forme of Cury.  The sentence in which it appears read "Take persel, sawge, garlec [etc.]..waische hem clene..andmyng hem wel with rawe oile, lay on vyneger and salt, and serue it forth."  It turns out that salads haven't changed much since the word entered our tongue.  I believe it must be because they're so darn good! Why fix what isn't broken?

Our salad has many cognate siblings in other Latinate languages, such as Portuguese. We also get our words sauce and salsa from the related Latin adjective salsus, meaning "salted", and our word sausage from the Late Latin word salsicius, meaning "prepared by salting" (American Heritage Dictionary.)

beach

Anyone else suffering from senioritis may appreciate this word, since it's just about all I can think about.

"Beach" is defined in the AHD as "the shore of a body of water, esp. when sandy or pebbly." It comes from the Middle English word "beche," which meant stream, and came from the Old English "bece" (AHD). The OED gives more interesting detail; apparently, the word originally referred specifically to the water-worn pebbles that sit at the shore, but "the transference of the term to the place covered by ‘beach,’ was easy for those who heard such phrases as ‘to lie’ or ‘walk on the beach,’ without knowing the exact significance (OED). I like how this example is a more concrete demonstration of what we have seen all semester, in the ways that meanings can be misconstrued over time due to the associations that they have.

Mire

Mire is such a lovely sounding word. If I didn't already know what it meant I would envision in my head a beautiful scene, but unfortunately it is quite the opposite.
According to the AHD the word mire is defined as:

1. An area of wet, soggy, muddy ground; a bog.
2. Deep slimy oil or mud.
3. A disadvantageous or difficult condition or situation

The word has its roots in Old Norse with the word myrr which meant bog and then made its way into Middle English.

pretend

Originally from the Latin praetendere , pre is the prefix prae meaning before and tend is from the stem tendere meaning to stretch out or extend. To pretend, in the classical meaning, is "to put forward as a pretext or reason, to allege, to offer or show deceptively, to make a pretence of."

It then goes through the French as prétendre, where it means primarily different things during different time periods, apparently:

to claim, demand (1320 in Old French),
to assert, allege (c1380),
to aspire to (1409),
to feign (a1412 or earlier),
to put forward as a pretext or reason (1470),
to intend (a1475),
to court (1638)

The word then comes into English to mean "to put forward as an assertion or statement; to allege, assert, contend, claim, declare" and especially "to allege or declare falsely or with intent to deceive."

I chose this word in remembering 'playing pretend' as a child, and now find it kind of depressing that the word has almost a negative connotation in the OED.

(all quotes and information in this are from the OED)

Glare

The various definitions for glare provided by the AHD include fairly strong words: 

"verb. 1. To stare fixedly or angrily. 2. To shine intensely and blindingly. 3. To be conspicuous; stand out obtrusively. noun. 1. A fierce or angry stare. 2a. An intense, blinding light. b. Garish or showy brilliance; gaudiness."

These descriptive definitions are particularly interesting when the word's etymology is taken into consideration. Glare comes to English through Middle English as glaren with the meaning "to glitter," and is said to be "akin" to the Middle Low German word glaren, "to glisten" (AHD): such seemingly mild origins for such a harshly defined word.

Thalassocracy

"Thalassocracy" is a "naval or commercial supremacy on the seas." "Thalassocracy" comes from the Greek word thalassokratia. Thalassokratia may be etymologically dissected into its components: thalassa (sea) + kratia (rule by).

-Source AHD

Alexithymic

Alexithymic is defined as "Displaying or characterized by an inability to recognize and express emotions." Alexithymic contains the Greek words , , and -, or "not or without," "speech," and "soul," respectively. The word is only 33 years old. It enters the English language in P. E. Sifneos' Short-Term Psychotherapy. He wrote that "Schizophrenic patients who are notorious for having ‘a lack of affect’ can at times have violent emotional explosions... The ability, then, not only to recognize and express emotions but also to verbalize them is significant... I would like to introduce the term alexithymic..to describe patients who present these difficulties."

Word definition and etymology: OED
Photo source: www.emotionalprocessing.org.uk

Pavilion

You are out on an amazing spring walk through a park. It's a bit cloudy, but you don't mind because it is warm, there's a light breeze, and general feelings of goodness are permeating the air. Suddenly, a thunder claps, and it starts to pour. Where do you go in such a crisis? To the nearest pavilion (or tree, but that's getting around the point)!

As a park enthusiast, I have always had a great appreciating for these little structures. Some can be quite elaborate (which is always refreshing during the middle of the summer, and you and some friends are trying to enjoy a day on trails and a lake), while others are shabby wooden tents. The AHD has an extensive list of definitions for these structures:

1. An ornate tent
2a. A light roofed structure for amusement or shelter, as at parks
2b. A usually temporary structure housing an exhibition at a fair or show
2c. A large structure housing sports or entertainment facilities; an area
3. A structure or building connected to a larger building; an annex
4. One of the buildings in a complex
5. The lower surface of a brilliant-cut gem, slanting outward from the culet to the girdle

The last one is a bit odd, but whatever. The reason I chose this post was not per se the word itself, but the etymology behind the word. The word comes from Middle English pavilon, which came from Old French pavillon. This in turn arrived from the Latin words papilio, papilion. The second word caught my eye. Last year for my saxophone quartet group, we played "Papillon." It was a French piece that was...interesting. Anywho, the word means "butterfly." And in Latin, this same word means "butterfly" or "tent." If we look at the first definition--"an ornate tent"--then we see that this is quite a poetic thing. Butterflies are beautiful but transitory creatures that captivate us during the spring and summer. A pavilion can be, in a sense, a transitory structure, or it can be an beautiful strucutre enjoyed by all, especially in the spring and summer.

Rain

I love rain. It's seriously amazing. Of course, rain isn't any fun when it's cold and icky outside and then it rains. But other than that, rain is one of the most amazing things in life.

Rain comes from the Middle English word reyn, which in turn comes from an Old English word, regn, or, rēn. It is defined as a noun as :

"1 a: water falling in drops condensed from vapor in the atmosphere
b: the descent of this water
c: water that has fallen as rain : rainwater

2 a: a fall of rain : rainstorm
b plural : the rainy season

3: rainy weather

4: a heavy fall rain of arrows>"

or, as a verb:

"intransitive verb

1 : to send down rain
2 : to fall as water in drops from the clouds
3 : to fall like rain rained down>

transitive verb
1 : to pour down
2 : to give or administer abundantly <rained blows on his head>"

So yes, it's raining out, but that's no reason to be sad. Something that was originally spelled as reyn can't be all bad.

appall

Appall is a verb that means "to fill with consternation or dismay." It comes from the Middle English appallen, which means "to grow faint." It entered English through Old French in the word apalir, from the Latin prefix ad-, to, toward and palir, to grow pale. Palir in turn coming from the Latin pallidus and pallēre meaning to grow pale.

Banjo

Everyone is familiar with the banjo. The AHD defines it as "A usually fretted stringed instrument having a narrow neck and a hollow circular body with a covering of skin or plastic under the bridge." It's a very common instrument with a very uncommon name. Wondering how the banjo obtained its name, I looked it up. The Oxford Companion to Music points out that "The banjo was developed by slaves on West Indian and American plantations" which accounts for the fact that it "is reminiscent of some West African instruments." The name may have come from one of these West African instruments: the banjo is probably akin to "a plucked stringed instrument" called an "mbanza" (AHD).

Ketchup

According to the AHD, the word we use to describe our beloved potato-dipping sauce probably comes from from the Cantonese dialect of Chinese, from a word kechap.  However, it was originally a fish sauce containing brine, herbs and spices.  Our dictionary mentions that it was probably taken by sailors to the European mainland, where it was then made with local ingredients.  In the 18th and 19th centuries, the word ketchup was used generally to refer to sauces that were made with vinegar before our current tomato version was adopted.  The first recorded use of the word in English was in 1690, and is still currently used with three spelling variations-- catchup, ketchup, and catsup.  I'm really kind of thankful that we don't dip our fries or spread our hamburger buns with fish sauce!

hesperidium

My word is inspired by the fact that the grocery store had blood oranges in the produce section on Sunday, and the blood orange is one kind of hesperidium.

Hesperidium is a noun denoting a berry with a leathery rind and its fruit in sections. Though we don't commonly think of lemons and oranges as "berries" exactly, they are, and citrus of all kinds are forms of hesperidia.

The name comes from Greek mythology and the Garden of the Hesperides where golden apples were said to grow.

The stem of the Greek word Hesperides is hesper-, and it means "evening" or "west" (since the sun sets in the west in the evening). Greek hesper- is traced back to the I-E root wespero-, meaning "evening" or "night," and the same I-E root working through different languages gives us west and vespers.

source: AHD

Escalate and Escalator

When looking at these two words, one would imagine that the word escalator means a thing which escalates. In fact, however, the origin of the words is the other way around. Escalator was originally a trademark, with no known etymology (according to the AHD), though presumably the -or suffix was used to mean "thing which," and the word contains the root of "scale." Escalate was reverse engineered from escalator, and has now entered our vocabulary to mean "to increase, enlarge or intensify" when transitive and "to increase in intensity or extent" when intransitive.

Frippery

My obsession with archaic words continues unabated, and today it manifests itself in another word of condescension. If one were to assume you, as an individual, were a head of a business in these trying economic times, you might be looking for a way to lighten the financial burden of running your occupation. Before your assembled board, you would declare:"Gentlemen and Ladies, we must rid our company of whatever pointless frippery we can!"

According to the AHD, frippery can be defined as pretentious, showy elegance. However, I am most familiar with the definition of "something trivial or nonessential". After all, there is no better put-down in the world than to decry another's belongings, or even their morals, as frippery! However, to find its roots, we must delve to the last language that bared it, that of the most foul and foreign French.

According to the AHD, we get Frippery from the French word friperie, which likewise comes from the Old French freperie, meaning "old clothes". Freperie, however, in turn comes from the Old French felpe and frepe, which share a root in the Medieval Latin word faluppa, meaning a worthless material.

The story for this one is quite simple: The very root of the word has the meaning we desire. As it passed through French, likely that is where it gained the connotation of being pretentious, as it was associated with old clothes. And, in all honesty, how else would any self-respecting generation classify the styles of those who went before them than as pretentious, especially considering the French Aristocracy?

flotsam & jetsam

Okay, so The Little Mermaid was my favorite Disney film as a kid. On my fourth birthday, I was found donning a red wig and sparkling green fins. That said, I was excited when, years later, I gained insight into the names of the characters in the animated film. Two of those characters to which I refer are Ursula's eels, who aid her in her evil scheme, Flotsam and Jetsam.

The technical definitions of flotsam and jetsam vary only slightly. "Flotsam" refers to "wreckage or cargo afloat after a shipwreck," while "jetsam" refers to "cargo or equipment thrown overboard to lighten a ship in distress" (AHD). Interestingly, "flotsam" is further defined as "vagrant, usually destitute people," while the most broadened definition of "jetsam" that our dictionary offers is simply "discarded odds and ends" (AHD). It makes sense that flotsam would have the more negative connotation, since it is the result of actual disaster, rather than the result of action taken to prevent a disaster. The AHD further explains that "in maritime law, flotsam applies to wreckage or cargo left floating on teh sea after a shipwreck. Jetsam applies to cargo or equipment thrown overboard [...] and either sunk or washed ashore." This further explains why "flotsam" developed the negative social connotation; perhaps to be a vagrant is to float aimlessly in a sea of society, with no final destination at hand.

"Flotsam" comes from the Anglo-Norman term "floteson," which was derived from the Old French "floter," or "to float," which is linked back to Germanic origins (AHD). "Jetsam," previously "jetson," was an alteration of the Middle English "jetteson," meaning "a throwing overboard" (AHD). This unexpectedly leads me back to an etymological path that I've already explained on this blog but will gladly do again; "jetteson" comes from the Anglo-Norman "getteson," which comes from the Vulgar Latin term "iectare," or "to throw" (AHD).

According to the OED, the first known usage of flotsam can be traced back to 1607, while jetsam seems to appear in 1570. I can't fathom why jetsam would have been used first, except for the speculation that as colonial ships confiscated more and more material goods over the years, there was too much cargo to jettison from the ship in time to prevent a wreck, and thus "flotsam" was born out of necessity. (Hey, we've heard crazier etymological stories, right?)

Photo courtesy of Disney, via http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.lair2000.net/Mermaid_Lyrics/instrumentals/flotsam_and_jetsam2.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.lair2000.net/Mermaid_Lyrics/instrumentals/Flotsam_And_Jetsam.html&usg=__4FoTGfrB2dfy3pvcwOR2rWgizQ4=&h=400&w=600&sz=95&hl=en&start=2&sig2=xfvq5f-78oxSVdZu5HBhFA&um=1&tbnid=LdguaD_C5vbbhM:&tbnh=90&tbnw=135&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dlittle%2Bmermaid%2Bflotsam%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-US:official%26sa%3DG%26um%3D1&ei=oQnISYuzIo34MaW9jZcJ

ferry

I visited New Orleans over spring break and saw and an incredible number of boats on the Mississippi River. While walking along one day, I started thinking about the word ferry, which can be both noun and verb. We had just finished our Latin section in class, so my mind jumped to the Latin stems fer-, lat-, “to carry.” I guessed that the name ferry had to do with that type of boat’s characterist ability to transport a large number of passengers and goods within a small radius. As it turns out, our AHD points me to the Middle English ferien derived from the Old English ferian. The OED gives us further information, demonstrating that the OE ferian is from the Old High German feren, which is from the Old Norse ferja, which comes from the Gothic farjan. I find it particularly interesting that ferry stems in the Gothic language because it is one that I rarely get the chance to hear or learn about. Also, the number of languages familiar with this term suggests the importance of water trade/interaction in landlocked but river-rich central Europe.

Moral

This entry's word is brought to you by Animaniacs. "Wheel of morality, turn, turn, turn. Tell us the lesson that we should learn."

The AHD defines the adjective moral as:

1. Of or concerned with the judgement of the goodness or badness of human action and character; ethical
2. Teaching or exhibiting goodness or correctness of character and behavior
3. Conforming to standards of what is right or just in behavior; virtuous
4. Arising from conscience sense or the sense of right and wrong

Looking at its origins, moral comes from the Latin moralis from mos, mor- meaning "custom". I really like the origin of this word because I feel that it provides a nice summary of what a moral actually is, a custom in a society concerning the definitions of right and wrong.

Brontosaurus

The brontosaur or brontosaurus has captured imaginations for generations. His name comes from Greek, bronte for thunder and saur for lizard, according to the AHD. Almost imponderably big, at 70 feet he is longer than a sperm whale. Like thunder, a brontosaur happens, and his surroundings can only endure the experience. Even his bare skeleton is a massive hulking thing, drawing children and adults alike to marvel at his size. You loved him. Your parents and grandparents loved him.

The brontosaur never existed.

He was, at best, a misclassification of juveniles of another genus, and at worst, an incorrect museum display brought on by museum politics. He is correctly called an apatosaurus today, from the Greek apate, meaning untruth or lie, according to the AHD. This is because the apatosaur is deceptively similar to several other dinosaur genus, not because its original name had been deceptive.

Meditate upon this for a moment. Through an etymological sleight-of-hand, our god-like thunder lizard had become a deceiving lizard. There is a bittersweet poetry to it, as scientific precision takes away some of the magic of the dinosaur - but then, we owe our knowledge and love of dinosaurs to science in the first place.

(The credits are on the photograph. I visited the wikipedia page on the apatosaurus to bone up on my paleontology.)

Incandesce

Our AHCD defines incandesce as, "to make or become incandescent." Incandescent is defined as, "Emitting visible light as a result of being heated... Shining brilliantly; very bright... Characterized by ardent emotion, intensity, or brilliance."

This word comes from the Latin word meaning to glow.

I can remember the first time I hear this word used for anything other then a lightbulb. It was when I was in the movie theatre excitedly watching the newest vertion of Pride and Prejudice for the first time. The beauty of the sound and meaning of the word incandescent has stuck with me ever since.

phoney / phony

I got in trouble for counterfeiting money, once.
I wasn’t being devious or anything; I’d just never gotten to play with a scanner, before.

In the ninth grade, I used the school's new printer to print a few black-and-white paper copies of a ten-dollar bill I had in my pocket. I couldn’t figure out how to print reverse images, so I had to cut the two sides of each bill out separately and stick them together with Elmer’s school glue.

--not exactly a criminal mastermind.

Anyway, I handed about five of them out to a few friends. “Look how cool I am, guys!”

They didn’t think I was very cool, but one of them took his home before he threw it away.

When his mother was doing some cleaning, she found the wadded bill in their kitchen garbage can and probably thought to herself “gee, why would someone throw away perfectly good black-and-white money?”

Believe it or not, she successfully spent it at Dollar General. It took a full day before the police came to my high school.

All the businesses in Dumas, Arkansas still mark ten-dollar bills with a marker before accepting them just in case I strike again.

---

Of course, I'm not the first person to pull one over on The Man.

In Britain around the turn of the 19th century, swindlers would often run a scam called a “fawney rig”, in which a dishonest individual would drop a brass ring gilded with gold in a public place.

The swindler would then pretend to find the ring and sell it as a genuine gold ring to a hapless patsy. He or she would sell it for less than the value of a real gold ring but for substantially more than the ring was actually worth.¹

From fawney, we get phony, which The Oxford English Dictionary defines as:

• adjective. Fake, sham, counterfeit; false; insincere.

• noun. A fake or counterfeit thing; a false or insincere person.²

The word fawney in “fawney rig” actually refers to the ring itself, from Irish Gaelic fáinne, meaning simply “ring”.

Fáinne, furthermore, is derivative of Old Irish ánne, also meaning “ring”.³

What's interesting about this, however, is that ánne is most likely the root of English “anus”.⁴ I'll leave it to you to draw the connection between the two.

So the next time you want to call somebody an asshole, why not instead try anus's quainter doublet?

IMPORTANT EDIT//

So it looks like I was one of "those" people, y'all. I lied to you. English "anus" comes from Latin "anus".

--my bad!

---

¹Grose, Francis. “fawney rig”. The 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue.
² “phoney”. Oxford English Dictionary. 2007. Oxford University Press. 23 March 2009. http://dictionary.oed.com/cgi/entry/50177691.
³“phony”. Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary. 2009. Merriam-Webster Online. 23 March 2009. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/phony.
⁴“anus”. Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary. 2009. Merriam-Webster Online. 23 March 2009. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/anus.

Alike

I think the word "alike" is simple, but very pretty, so I wanted to see where it comes from.
It is actually a blend, coming from the Old English words anlich (from OE onlic) and ilich (from OE gelic). This blend was later influenced by the Old Norse word, alikr to become the middle English alich.

The definitions given by the AHD include;
1)Resembling closely;similar.
2)In the same manner or to the same degree.

To further elaborate on the Old English words, here are some definitions from Albert Cook's The Old English Elene, Phoenix, and Physiologus:

Onlic-Super
Gelic-like, similar


Note: All etymological background taken from the AHD

Zucchetto, Zucchini

Zucchetto, according to the AHD is the "skullcap worn by certain Roman Catholic priests," the cap's color depicts the rank and order of the priest. 

Zucchini, is a lovely squash of summer's harvest with an "elongated shape and a smooth thin green rind" (AHD).

Each of the above words is a diminutive of the Italian word for squash, zucca; however, in our example of the skullcap the additional definition of "head" is also given. Therefore, it wouldn't be entirely inaccurate to refer to a Roman Catholic priest (wearing the zucchetto, of course) as a "squash head." Although, I am sure the spirit with which this comment is received would depend upon the jocundity of the speaker.

Zucchini Image Credit: Barry Wong/Getty Images

Campaign

As a noun campaign means "a series of military operations undertaken to achieve a large-scale objective during a war." It comes from the French campagne, from the Italian campagna meaning field, military operation, which comes from the Late Latin campānia meaning open country or battlefield, and ultimately comes from the Latin campus meaning field.

--The American Heritage College Dictionary Fourth Edition

Labile

"Labile" has two definitions : "1. Open to change;adaptable. 2. A Chemistry term meaning constantly undergoing change; unstable." An example sentence: The patient's blood pressure was extremely labile.The etymology of "labile" comes from the Late Latin word labilis (apt to slip), and then passing through Old French labile , and the Middle English word labil (wandering) before entering its modern day English form.

Source: AHD

Realm

The AHD defines realm as "A community or territory over which a soverign rules; a kingdom".

This word came to English through and Old French alteration of the Latin word regimen, meaning "government" (the french alteration was reial, meaning "royal"). The Latin word regimen comes from the Latin word regere, meaning "to rule". Did you know that this was from a stem we knew?

(All etymological history came from AHD)

Vitriol

As a chemical/biological nerd, I really like this word I randomly stumbled upon. I'll work backwards through the definitions. According to the AHD, the everyday use of this would would be to describe a "bitterly abusive feeling or expression." This ties in with it's first definition. Vitriol is a common name for sulfuric acid. So a bitter remark is like throwing acid at the person. Cute, no?
But sulfuric acid is not the only substance that the name vitriol originally covered. Vitriols compose an entire subset of chemicals based off of mineral sulfate groups, such as zinc sulfate, copper (II) sulfate, iron (II) sulfate, ect. These salts were called vitriol because of their glass-like appearance. This, in turn, leads to the words etymological definition: glass(1). From Latin vitrum (glass), we got vitreus, which in turn became vitreolum in late Latin(1). Medival Latin turned the word into vitriolum, from where the old French and Middle English took the word(1). During the Middle Ages, this word was then applied to all the salts, and in the 8th century sulfuric acid was created(2). It gained the name vitriol (or oil of vitriol/spirit of vitriol), and from there it entred into everyday language was a way to describe an "acidic" remark(2). Interesting!

___________________________________________________________________
1- AHD
2-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitriol

Anaesthesia

Anaesthesia is defined as "1. loss of sensation, esp. tactile sensibility, induced by disease, injury, acupuncture, or an anesthetic. 2. Insensibility to pain, induced by an anesthetic. 3. A drug that induces partial or total loss of sensation in the body and may be topical, local, regional, or general." The word is ultimately Greek in origin and can be broken down to an- (without) and aisthesis (feeling). In 1846 Oliver Wendell Holmes contextualized the word as we use it today. He wrote, "Everybody wants to have a hand in a great discovery. All I will do is to give a hint or two as to names -- or the name -- to be applied to the state produced and the agent. The state should, I think, be called 'Anaesthesia.' This signifies insensibility. . . . The adjective will be 'Anaesthetic.' Thus we might say the state of Anaesthesia or the anaesthetic state." Doctors specializing in this field are called anaesthesiologists and the study of anaesthesia is anaesthesiology.

Definition and word history: AHD
Photo source: http://anesthesioboist.blogspot.com/2008/10/ether-day-2008.html

Ballistic

I was watching a marathon of Mythbusters over the weekend, and over the course of several episodes I noticed that they often used a substance known as ballistics gel to test impacts upon the human body. This made me wonder: what is ballistics gel?

Ballistics gel is a special type of gel formula that replicates the characteristics of human flesh, according to Encyclopedia Brittanica. The gel is most commonly used in the science of ballistics, which the AED defines as the study of the dynamics of projectiles, their motion and their effects.

Ballistic can also be used as an adjective, describing something related to ballistics, or as slang meaning "to become very angry or irrational".

Ballistics is derived from the Latin word ballistas, which the AED says is borrowed from the Greek word balistes, coming from the verb ballein, meaning to throw. The ballista was an ancient and medieval machine of warfare used to throw heavy projectiles, according to the AED. It relied upon different mechanics, using two levers with torsion springs instead of a prod, the springs consisting of several loops of twisted skeins. Early versions ejected heavy darts or spherical stone projectiles of various sizes for siege warfare.

Millennium

The AHD states that the noun millennium is "a span of one thousand years," "a thousandth anniversary," and also "a hoped-for period of joy, prosperity, and justice." The first two are more familiar to me than the last definition. In fact, I've never heard millennium in that sense before. The etymological history of the word rests with the New Latin word mille, meaning thousand, and annus, meaning year. Simple and uncomplicated, this word has a certain vibe too it and the way it sounds to me is melodious and fairly calming.

Soweto

The American Heritage Dictionary defines Soweto as "A city of NE South Africa SW of Johannesburg. Comprised of a number of townships inhabited by Black South Africans." When I visited this urban area a resident informed me that most Western visitors wrongly assume that its name somehow comes from a language native to Africa. He said that the name is actually an acronym for South Western Townships. Apparently Soweto was named for its relationship to an area held by whites during the apartheid regime (as the AHD pointed out, Soweto is located "SW of Johannesburg").

assassin

Our American Heritage dictionary gives two definitions for the word assassin:

"1. One who murders by surprise attack, esp. one who carries out a plot to kill a prominent person.
2. A member of a secret Muslim order that killed Crusaders and others."

I had never known about the second definition before today. Nor did I know that this word ultimately comes to English from the plural form of the Arabic word hasas, hassasin. This arabic word literally means "hashish user." After reading this out of our dictionary, I sought out the connection between murderers and drug users over this word's history with quick visit to our friendly OED. It provides the following clue:

"1. lit. A hashish-eater. Hist. (in pl.) Certain Muslim fanatics in the time of the Crusades, who were sent forth by their sheikh, the ‘Old Man of the Mountains,’ to murder the Christian leaders."

In an early literary usage of the word, J. Wolff (1860) tells us:

"The assassins, who are otherwise called the People of the Man of the Mountain, before they attacked an enemy, would intoxicate themselves with a powder made of hemp-leaves, out of which they prepared an inebriating electuary, called hashish."

Now that the book is closed on the mystery of these dope-crazed killing fiends, I feel compelled to leave you, dear readers, with a simple piece of advice: Don't Do Drugs. You might kill someone!

volume

The word volume comes from Latin volumen (denoting a written scroll), and volumen itself is a noun related to the verb volvere (to roll) because a volumen would be unrolled and re-rolled in the process of being read. I like how volume--referring to a written work presented in book format--contains an historical reminder that there used to be another technology for disseminating the written word.

Jack Kerouac's first draft of On the Road was typed as a kind of scroll. As he was working at his typewriter, Kerouac taped together pieces of paper so that the entire text is on one long sheet. You can see a picture at http://www.ontheroad.org/. The Kerouac scroll differs from an ancient scroll in that an ancient volumen has writing in multiple columns and each column runs along the width of the scroll, not along its entire length. The Jewish Torah is still written that way:

sources: AHD, OED, and public domain image (in the US) from Wikipedia

Eldritch

The thing cannot be described--there is no language for such abysms of shrieking and immemorial lunacy, such eldritch contradictions of all matter, force and cosmic order.
- From "The Call of Cthulhu" by H. P. Lovecraft, 1926

Our connections to words often come from the first story in which we encountered them, and this is especially true if the word is uncommon or unusual. The early 20th Century horror writer Howard Philips Lovecraft had a unique vocabulary, making his writings a treasure trove of fascinating words. Indeed, the easiest way to recognize Lovecraft (or another writer aping Lovecraft) is from the vocabulary; the moon will be gibbous, the ruins cyclopean, and the terrible cosmic horrors will inevitably be eldritch.

According to the AHD, eldritch means "strange or unearthly; eerie." It comes from the Old English "el-", meaning strange or other, and "rice" meaning realm. Unlike many words of Old English descent, it does not appear in Litterature until (according to the OED) 1508, in the form "elrich." The d seems to be a case of excrescence, first appearing in 1789. Because of its late appearance in extant litterature, the AHD can only hypothesize the Middle English form "elriche." In any event, if the word did indeed pass through Middle English, it was relatively unaffected by French.

Procrastinate

Oh, to procrastinate. I seem to excel at this activity, which is why I am up at 3 in the morning writing a this entry. The AHD defines procrastinate as a verb meaning "To put off doing something, esp. out of habitual carelessness or laziness" or (less harshly, in my opinion) "to postpone or delay needlessly." I have a tendency towards procrastinating and, as I discovered tonight, so do my friends.
Apparently, this is not a recent activity as this word has its etymoloical roots in Latin and has changed little since it first appeared. The latin word for procrastinate is prcrstint in which pro we know to mean forward, and crastinus means of tomorrow (which can be further dissected with cras meaning specifically 'tomorrow.')

http://www.blurburger.com/shoebox/toons/albums/toons/toon_procrastinator.gif (this is just a cute comic I thought I might share with you all because I thought all the words used were cute)

Poppycock

Picture it; You're at a fancy gala, enjoying the festivities, when you happen to overhear some boisterous braggart announcing to all the world a myriad of fanciful tales the likes of which no sensible person would condone. In order to denounce this charlatan, you wheel about and cry, of course, "poppycock!"

In holding with my fondness for odd and archaic words, poppycock is a fun word that really puts people off balance. However, it's simply a noun that means "Senseless talk: Nonsense"(AHD) A look at it would suggest some obvious etymologies, but intriguingly, the word has absolutely nothing to do with the words it appears to be comprised of.

In reality, poppycock is a portmanteau, but not of what it appears to be. It comes from a Dutch dialectal word pappekak. Pappekak is formed of two seperate words: pap, which comes from the Middle Dutch word pappe, which may be from the Latin word pappa, meaning food, and kak, meaning dung, which comes from the Middle Dutch kacken, which in turn comes from the Latin cacre, both meaning "to defecate". (AHD)

So, while the etymological story for this one is sort of self explanatory, describing it politely is a trial, at best. Perhaps one way to put it is that, as a food, dung is most certainly useless... much like poppycock is useless talk...

Puddle

The weather this last week has been rather wet, leaving many puddles all around campus. Puddle is an odd word to describe a sizable pool of water, and this thought alone led me to trace its origins.

The OED defines a puddle as "a small, shallow, typically temporary pool formed in a depression on the ground or another surface by rainfall, flooding, overflow, etc." The OED also uses puddle to describe any pool of liquid, and also humourously to decribe any body of water seen as insignificant.

The AED holds a similar definition of puddle, followed by a fairly uncommon usage: "a tempered paste of wet clay and sand that serves as waterproofing when dry."

Etymologically, puddle comes from the Middle English word podel, which is a diminuitive of the Old English word pudd, which means "ditch".

Sabbat

I'm currently taking History of Magic and Witchcraft in the Middle Ages (or something along those lines) and while writing a paper for that class, I realized how much the word "sabbat" comes up. I used to think that it was a misspelling and that they had actually meant "sabbath", until I realized that every line, paragraph, and text could not have that many misspellings.

As it turns out, I'm slightly right. Sabbat is a common misspelling of sabbath and sabot, according to Websters online dictionary (my computer even wants me to exchange it for one of the first five words it thinks the word should actually be). But, sabbat has since come to mean (on it's own accord) "a midnight meeting of witches to practice witchcraft and sorcery; in the Middle Ages it was supposed to be a demonic orgy." Well! Isn't that just grand? Of course, in neopaganism it is referred to as "one of the eight major seasonal festivals which make up the Wheel of the Year."

Sabbat itself comes from a French version of sabbath. The history of "sabbath" is actually pretty intense, and instead of trying to paraphrase it all, I've decided to show you just what it said:

"O.E. sabat "Saturday," observed by the Jews as a day of rest, from L. sabbatum, from Gk. sabbaton, from Heb. shabbath, prop. "day of rest," from shabath "he rested." The Babylonians regarded seventh days as unlucky, and avoided certain activities then; the Jewish observance may have begun as a similar custom. From the seventh day of the week, it began to be applied c.1410 to the first day (Sunday), a change completed during the Reformation."

So, there's my history of sabbat, and as it turns out, sabbath, also. The rest of you may not come across this word as much as I, but for the few people in our class that I know are in my M&WC class, hopefully this does something for you.

By the way, this site must have some of the greatest things to go along with its entries. Really.
http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/definition/sabbat
www.etymonline.com

Niddering, Wretch

Niddering is an archaic word meaning "A cowardly person; a wretch." It comes from a misreading of the Middle English word nithing. It went through Old English (nithing) from Old Norse, nidhingr and the original Norse word nidh, meaning scorn.

Wretch is a noun meaning "A miserable, unfortunate, or unhappy person or a person regarded as base, mean, or despicable." It went through Middle English as the word wrecched from the Old English word wrecca meaning exile or wretch.

Bellow

I've always thought that bellow was a very powerful sounding word and its sound fits its definition perfectly.

As a verb, according to the AHD, to bellow means:

1. To roar deeply, as does a bull.

2. To shout in a deep voice.

In noun form a bellow is a loud shouting or roaring noise.

This word is completely from English going back to Old English with the words belgan, meaning to be enraged and bylgan, meaning to bellow. It then traveled to Middle English and transformed into the word belwen.

wistful

A boy told me this weekend that "wistful" is his very favorite word. He might have been lying because he was in an act of persuasion, but let us humor him and pretend he was in earnest.

Our AHD defines wistful as "full of wishful yearning" and "pensively sad; melancholy." It lists the etymology as obsolete, noting it comes from, probably, wistly, which means intently.

The OED notes, "in early use mainly poetical" and lists its first usage to be cf. 1613-1616.

Humble

This word is defined by the AHD as, "Marked by meekness or modesty in behavior, attidude, or spirit; not arrogant or prideful."

According to the AHD, "humble" came through Old French from the Latin humus which means "ground."

I've always loved this word. As a child I had no idea what it meant, but it had a majestic, and somewhat mysterious, quality to it. I think I gave a connotation of power or greatness into the word, because I only heard the word in reference to Jesus in church. I guess I still give it that connotation. Being humbled is priceless, and being humble is a characteristic worth striving for.

Sanguine

Sanguine, as defined by the AHD, is of the color of blood, having a red or ruddy complexion, or having the personality thought to be connected to this complexion: passionate, or cheerful, confident, and optimistic.

One might say that one is feeling sanguine about one's chances at the races. One might also say that a popular, extroverted person who enjoys and excels at social interaction is sanguine.

It comes from Latin: sanguineus (from sanguis, sanguin - blood), through Old French into Middle English. Compare this to the anglo-saxon term hot blooded, meaning easily excited or angered (AHD again).

I like the word sanguine because it ties an emotional state or psychological trait to the visceral and physical existence of the body, circumventing the Cartesian division between the physical and nonphysical that dictates much of our cultural understanding of reality. Furthermore, the word sanguine itself sounds good to me as well as having a good mouth-feel when being said. Try it. Sanguine.

Peace

This past Thursday I went to the Invisible Children event, and since then the situation in Uganda has been at the front of my mind. Since peace is something that it seems we so rarely have and so often strive for, I thought it would be interesting to see where a word that holds such a large idea and emotional weight for so many gets its roots.

The AHD defines Peace as, "The absence of war or other hostilities" and "An agreement or a treaty to end hostilities... inner contentment; serenity." This word comes from Latin pax, through Old French and Middle English. The Latin word PAX can mean, "A time of wide-ranging stability when there is only a single dominate power." PAX is also used more broadly for any "peace."

smorgasbord

A smorgasbord is a "a buffet meal featuring a varied number of dishes" or a "varied collection." Whenever I hear this word I think about Templeton, the rat, from the animated Charlotte's Web singing about the feast he comes upon after the fair.

Smorgasbord comes from the Sweedish smörgåsbord, smörgås meaning bread and butter, (smör, meaning butter, from Old Norse and the Swedish dialectal gås, "lump of butter" from Old Norse gās meaning goose (see gosling) + bord meaning table, from Old Norse bordh. If we continue our etymological history with gosling, we see it comes from the Middle English variant of gesling (influenced by gos, goose) from Old Norse gæslingr a diminutive of gās (goose).

--American Heritage College Dictionary Fourth Edition

Cybernetics

Cybernetics, according to the AHD, is a noun meaning:

"The theoretical study of communication and control processes in biological, mechanical, and electronic systems, esp. the comparison of these processes in biological and artificial systems."

Its origins are in the Greek word kubernetes, "governor", from kubernan, meaning "to govern". The relation between its origins and its meaning could be that cybernetics involves control processes, so it is therefore involved in governing. More and more often I run into this word in the form of its shortened prefix "cyber-" or "cyb-" in such words as cyborg, cyberpunk, cyberspace , cybercafe, etc.

Lounge

The word lounge, according to the OED, has an obscure origin. It is suspected to come from Lungis, but it is uncertain. The AHD believes it to come from the Indo-European root del meaning "long". The verb could have possibly come from allonger, meaning "to stretch out" in French. The sequence of this option comes from Latin prefix ad combined with longus (long). Once again, this is just speculation and nothing can be confirmed.

The definitions given by the AHD include;

1) To move or act in a lazy, relaxed, or idle way
2) A public waiting room often having smoking or lavatory facilities
3) An establishment or a room in an establishment where cocktails are served
4) A long couch, esp. one having no back and a headrest at one end

maudlin :'(

Have you ever had to deal with someone like this?
We’ve all been there, right? It’s Friday night, so your friend decided he or she was “really going to cut loose,” so they downed a fifth of something heinous, and now here they are, crying on your shoulder at 1:00 in the morning.

“I just *sniff* want you to know *sniff* that our friendship *hiccup* means… everything… to BAAAAAAAAAAAWWW!”

Maybe you’ve been that person. I hate that person. If you’ve been ever been that person, or have ever been within thirty yards of that person, then you know what I mean when I say maudlin.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines maudlin as:

[…]

2. Having reached the stage of drunkenness characterized by tearful sentimentality and effusive displays of affection; characteristic of (the behaviour of) someone who has reached this stage.*

3. Characterized by shallow sentimentality; mawkishly emotional; weakly sentimental.¹

[…]

What if I told you when you accuse someone of being maudlin, you’re actually comparing them to a Biblical saint?

Because the root of maudlin is actually Magdalene, as in Mary Magdelene. –Y’know, the star of The DaVinci Code.

Turns out that before she was a conspiracy theory, Mary Magdalene was mostly known for three things**:

1) weeping profusely and washing Jesus’ feet with her hair² [this is contested]³

2) weeping profusely when Jesus was crucified⁴

3) witnessing Christ’s resurrection …and weeping⁵

Maudlin is actually a British-accent corruption of the name Magdalene (French: Madelaine).⁶ It seems spelling just followed pronunciation, creating a strange, but necessary neologism. I mean, what else are you going to call Drunky McCrybaby? Annoying?

*It’s interesting to note that according to the Oxford English Dictionary, the “drunken” connotation of maudlin existed possibly before the simple sense of “weepy”.
**Mary Magdalene is actually never explicitly depicted weeping in the Bible. This was apparently simply inferred by Renaissance-era painters, who were using The Penance of the Prostitute² as a reference point.

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¹"maudlin." Oxford English Dictionary. 2007. Oxford University Press. 1 March 2009.
²Luke 7:37-38. The Holy Bible. New King James Version.
³"Mary Magdalene." Wikipedia. 2009. 1 March 2009. .
⁴Mark 15:40. The Holy Bible. New King James Version.
⁵Luke 24. The Holy Bible. New King James Version.
⁶ Freeman, Morton S. “Maudlin”. Page 163. A New Dictionary of Eponyms. Oxford University Press, 1997.
***Image of Mary Magdalene from The Crucifixion, by Ercole de Roberti.