1715: Diminutive Suffixes in German Dialect Aug 25, 2019
About 80% of Yiddish vocabulary is from German, more or less depending on dialect, but when it comes to grammar the number is harder to discern. For instance, it is common for Yiddish to have the diminutive suffix -l (ל-), even using this in place of the word for small 'kleyn' (קליין) as is the case in German. For instance, 'city' in German is 'Stadt' (pronounced like SH-t [ʃt]), and in Yiddish it's 'shtot' (שטאָט), but a town—when not a village—is sometimes 'Kleinstadt' or just 'kleine Stadt' in German but 'shtetl' (שטעטל) in Yiddish. However, this Yiddish feature is Germanic, not Slavic or Hebraic, and does appear infrequently in some dialects. For instance, the Austrian town Neustadtl an der Donau (literally: New Little Town on the Danube) uses this convention, which is not really standard for German.
1714: copper metal Aug 24, 2019
While 'copper' for 'policeman' might not be related to metal, the history of the term for a metal is much richer. The word may ultimately come from Latin in the form of 'cuprum', but the whole thing comes from Cyprus, insofar as that Latin was a contraction of 'Cyprium aes': Cypriot metal. In fact, the first ever man-made metal alloy, 'bronze' is made partly from copper, and was originally made in that part of the world. It was so common that the words for 'copper', 'bronze', or even metal objects— particularly cash coins—were at times indistinguishable in Latin, simply referred to as 'aes'. Eventually 'cuprum' meant the distinct copper we know today, and 'aes' became 'ore' when it entered English.
1713: copper Aug 23, 2019
There's a belief that the term 'copper' for police officer comes from copper badges, but this is folk etymology. Instead, it comes from the verb 'to cop', meaning 'to seize' referencing their arrests. This root is very old however, and it is also related to the modern word 'cheap', since the root word (something like 'kap-') meant 'to grab' and in other languages derivative terms sometimes mean 'to buy'.
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1712: sjikker (Dutch) Aug 22, 2019
Following from yesterday, there looks like at least one exception to the Germanic patter of words similar to 'siker' meaning 'safe; certain', and that's the Dutch 'sjikker' meaning 'drunk'. This is actually not related at all, and comes from Hebrew rather than Latin like the others ultimately. Dutch and Hebrew—neither Biblical nor Modern—were in much contact, so 'sjikker' comes from the Hebrew שִׁיכּור (šikkōr) meaning 'drunkard' via Yiddish שיכּור (shiker). This Yiddish word has in turn also led to the German 'schikker' and the English 'shikker' (alcoholic) but these are both fairly dated.
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1711: sure and secure Aug 21, 2019
1710: czar and tsar Aug 20, 2019
The titles of 'kaiser', 'caesar', and 'czar' all mean 'emperor' in different languages, but 'czar' can also be spelt 'csar', 'tzar' or 'tsar'. The word in Russian is царь with ц representing the 'ts' (ь is the symbol for softening consonants). It is not uncommon for a single letter to represent this double-articulation; German orthography does this with Z and the Hebrew alphabet has צ as an equivalent, but the difference here in spelling from using the increasingly standard Ts/Tz for English words broadly, and was adopted later. Cs/Cz is older was introduced into English by a Slovenian, Sigismund von Herberstein, who used the convention used by many Slavic or other Eastern Europeans for writing that sound generally.
1709: Robert the Bruce Aug 19, 2019
While 'of Arc' was a name and not a title for 'Joan of Arc', 'Bruce' was a title and a name for Robert the Bruce. For the Scottish king known as both Robert I and Robert VIII de Bruce in Scotland, he actually follows a line of men named Robert de Brus that went back at least 200 years before his birth. The change from 'de Brus' to 'the Bruce' was not ubiquitous at the time, though it mostly is now, but it was simply a misinterpretation of the French 'de' (of). 'Bruce'—both here and as the modern first name—comes from the Norman city 'Brix' meaning 'the willowlands'. Scotland was close diplomatically to the French, and most nobility used 'de', like his contemporary Sir Roger de Kirkpatrick of Closeburn.
1708: Joan of Arc pt. 2 Aug 18, 2019
Joan of Arc's name wasn't 'of Arc' (d'Arc in French) as discussed yesterday, but it is even more complicated than this. For one thing, her name wasn't Joan as it is in English, or even really Jeanne as it is rendered in French, but Jehanne as she spelt it. It was rendered as Joan in English because there was no other equivalent at the time, though now there are many female forms of John. Also, her father's surname was something like Darc (though there are many other possibilities) but in Medieval society, a woman took her mother's name; in Joan's case her mother's was 'Romée' but she also went by Isabelle de Vouthon. Last names weren't universal in Medieval France though, and she mostly was called "la Pucelle d'Orléans" (The Maid of Orleans).
1707: Joan of Arc pt. 1 Aug 17, 2019
In European societies, it was typical for the titles of nobility to include place-names, but with "Joan of Arc" or "Jeanne d'Arc", this was not the case. She was not born in Arc but Domrémy. Moreover she was a peasant and this was her father's name, so it definitely wasn't for nobility. It is believed instead that this comes from a misinterpretation of 'Darc' or 'Dars' or something like this. French elides its vowels so 'de' before places with vowels it is now written d', but the apostrophe was not always part of French spelling.Since the apostrophe would not be used until later in French, and because surnames were not universal then, it was miscorrected after her death. There will be more on her name tomorrow.
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1706: (Art)ificial Aug 16, 2019
The word 'artificial' often has connotations towards 'insincere' or 'unnatural', but like 'artifice', this is not what it originally meant. Initially, it just meant 'hand-crafted', although certain phrases like 'artificial intelligence' use 'artificial' this way, since 'art' used to mean 'craft; skill'. This is even exhibited in the German word for 'artificial intelligence' is 'künstliche Intelligenz'; in German 'Kunst' is 'art' so while not a loan word, the pattern is still the same.
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1705: Solomon Islands and Africa Aug 15, 2019
It is commonly known Columbus thought the Caribbean to be India upon arrival but a less known false assumption was that the Spanish thought the Solomon Islands (officially just "Solomon Islands") to be the Biblical lands of Ophir, famous for its wealth. The riches were not there as people of other islands claimed, but the name stuck. This is not the first time a place has been thought to be Ophir, as has happened in South America, Asia, and Africa before, but this is most obvious with Africa as the name comes from the Romanized form of one Carthaginian tribe who lived in the wealthy area of what is now Tunisia, it is theorized that this is where Ophir really was. If this is true, it ultimately is believed to come from the native Phoenician for either 'dust' (afar) or more likely 'cave' (ifri).
1704: Biblical Translation Issues Aug 14, 2019
Read more like this here.
1703: dairy Aug 13, 2019
1702: babysitting Aug 12, 2019
It is not know where '-sit' in 'babysit' comes from, but what is known is that the word evolved in an atypical manner. The first recorded use of the phrase comes from the 1930's in the form of 'babysitter' with 'babysit' following a decade later. This is called backformation, and it may have occurred doubly, as 'babysitting' is documented at least a year before 'babysit' as well, though this could just be due to the means of data-collection, and not so indicative.
Either way, the '-sit' is thought to come from an older meaning of the word, some saying it relates to hens sitting on eggs, and others say it comes from the idea of someone sitting by a crib.
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1701: wink and blink Aug 11, 2019
Though they sound similar, 'wink' and 'blink' have totally different origins. For one thing, 'wink' used to mean what 'blink' does now. This changed over time in the Middle Ages in part due to 'wince', to which it is related, and other senses of the word meaning 'blink irregularly' or even 'to signal'. Blinking on the other hand, meant something more like 'twinkle; shine' and also related to grimacing in pain, being related to 'blench'. It only came to mean what it does after meaning "sharply or suddenly moving the eyelids", but this connection is pretty close.
See more about etymologies here: https://youtu.be/AviuxNIvdPM
1700: Gods in Cosmic Names (S.S.7) Aug 10, 2019
Over the last week, the posts have focused on naming things in our solar system. An obvious source is the Roman pantheon of gods, and while that may seem strange, looking at other cultures it is anything but. In languages ranging from Chinese to Hebrew to Nahuatl, rather than using the same words—even in scientific contexts as is often the case—different mythological systems will inspire naming the cosmos. Indeed, even in newer discoveries this happens. With 'Neptune', named for its blue color like the ocean and the Roman god thereof, it is 'Rahab' (רהב) in Hebrew named for a sea monster and 'Tlāloccītlalli' in Nahuatl after the Aztec rain-god. While these are newer, most cultures used mythology to inspire the names of these celestial bodies, and the two often related culturally as well. This concludes the week-long series, but you can can get them all together here.
1699: Men are from Mars and Women from Venus: Naming Conventions (S.S.6) Aug 9, 2019
There are many naming conventions for features of planets, such as siller ones mentioned yesterday, as well as more traditional ones. For instance, with few exceptions, all the features of Venus have feminine names, and all the features of Mars have masculine ones. There are at least 3 physical features named for male scientists on Venus, but even so most modern naming is feminine. This comes from the idea that Mars and Venus as gods represented the male and female forms, and any newer names are a nod to this.
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1698: Non-Roman Planetary Naming Conventions (S.S.5) Aug 8, 2019
All other planets in the solar system (and a few other bodies) are named for Roman gods, but modern naming conventions are a bit less grandiose. Lord of the Rings, for instance, has been the inspiration for the names of some of the features of Titan, a Saturnian moon, and authors who wrote about Mars were memorialized in the names of physical features on Deimos, a Martian moon, named for the god of terror to correspond with Mars, the god of war. There are numerous easter-eggs—informal and formal—like this in cosmic, and particularly galactic nomenclature, so if you know any more, feel free to leave a comment, though there will be more tomorrow about other, older traditions.
Read more from the last few days here.
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1697: planets (S.S.4) Aug 7, 2019
Pluto was demoted from being a planet in 2006, but this was not the first time something like that's happened. The word 'planet' was not terribly meaningful throughout much of history. Classically, both the Sun and the Moon were considered planets, part of the "seven classical planets". The word 'planet' comes from two Greek words, πλάνης (planēs) and πλανήτης (planētēs). The former meant 'planet' like we'd think now but also 'star', and they both meant 'wanderer', describing anything moving in the cosmos.
See more from the Solar System Series here.
1696: neptune (S.S.3) Aug 6, 2019
Again, of the two planets unknown (as planets) to the Romans, 'Neptune' still got a Roman name (see 'uranus' here). At first, it was just called "Le Verrier's planet" after the discoverer, but the English again pushed for Uranus to be called 'Herschel' after its discoverer, and these were used for a short time, until it was decided to keep tradition and name the planets after Roman mythology, so 'Neptune' was selected, as it is an icy, blue planet, and therefore named after the god of the ocean. Many other language's name for the planet come from their respective mythology around the ocean as well, from Chinese to Hebrew and even Nahuatl, rather than using the same word. There will be more on this tomorrow.