Category: Etymology

Word skipping to Venus

By Simon

I was asked today about the origins of the word worship. The person who asked was told by a highly-educated minister that “worship” is derived from an old English word, “word-skip”. Supposedly, “word-skip” means “word shaper” or “shaper of words”.

According to the Online Etymology Dictionary: worship comes from the Old English worðscip, wurðscip (Anglian), weorðscipe (West Saxon), “condition of being worthy, honor, renown”, from weorð (worthy), and -scipe, “state, condition of being”. The sense of “reverence paid to a supernatural or divine being” is first recorded in about 1300. The original sense is preserved in the title worshipful (c.1300). The verb to worship first appears in writing from about 1200. The word weorð comes from the Proto Germanic *werthaz (toward, opposite), which is possibly a derivative of Proto-Indo-European word *wert- (to turn, wind). from *wer- (to turn, bend).

The OED and the Collins Dictionary give the same etymology, and the OED lists the numerous ways worship was written in Middle English, including worðscipe, worðschipe, worðschepe, worþssipe, worþschip, wortscip, wortschyp, worsipe, worssipe, and so on.

The Dictionary of Word Origins says the worship originally meant “worthiness, distinction, credit, dignity” in Old English. Later is came to mean “respect or reverence”, and was used in religious contexts from the 13th century, and that is was used as a verb from the 12th century.

A related word is venerate, from the Latin venerāt- from venerārī/venerāre (to reverence, worship, adore), which comes from venus (beauty, love desire), from the Proto-Indo-European base *wen- (to strive after, wish, desire, be satisfied) [source]. This is also the root of the words for worship in Italian (venerare), Portuguese (venerar) and French (vénérer). The equivalent in Spanish is adorar or rendir culto a.

Purses and sporrans

By Simon

The word purse has an interesting history, I discovered today. It comes from the Old English word purs, from the Late Latin word bursa, which had a number of meanings of the centuries, including skin or leather; (money) bag; scrotum; exchange; and scholarship, allowance, and comes from the Greek word βύρσα (hide, leather).

bursa is also the root of bursar, bursary, purser and reimburse; and of words for purse in the Celtic languages: sparán (Irish) sporan (Scottish Gaelic), sporran (Manx), as well as the French word bourse (grant, purse, stock market, stock exchange), the Spanish word bolsa (bag, exchange, stock exchange, pocket, purse), and of similar words in quite a few other languages.

In British English purse usually refers to a small container used, mainly women, to keep their money, credit cards, etc in – British men generally carry their money in their pockets and/or in a wallet. What do Americans carry their money in?

In American English purse generally refers to a bag used to keep money, keys and other essentials in, especially by women – also known as a pocketbook (?). The British English equivalent the American purse is a handbag.

Sources: OED, Dictionary of Word Origins, Cambridge Dictionaries Online

Telling tales

By Simon

Earlier this week I went to a Christmas show entitled Beasts and Beauties in Kendal. It wasn’t a traditional Christmas pantomime, though did include some pantomimesque elements, but rather a series of eight fairy/folk tales from around Europe, including:

– The Emperor’s New Clothes or Kejserens nye Klæder by Hans Christian Andersen (Danish)
– Bluebeard or La Barbe bleue by Charles Perrault (French)
– The Juniper Tree or Von dem Machandelboom a story collected by the Brothers Grimm in Low German
– The Girl and the North Wind (Norwegian). This one was originally The Lad who went to the North Wind or Gutten som gikk til nordavinden

It was all in English in various accents with occasional words in the other languages, and was well put together and acted.

It’s interesting to see the original texts of these tales and to discover the ways they start, which tend to be formulaic – the equivalents of the English ‘Once upon a time’. For example stories might start with ‘For mange Aar siden …’ in Danish, ‘Il était une fois …’ in French, ‘Dat is nu all lang heer …‘ in Low German, ‘Det var engang …‘ in Norwegian,

Such stories are usually referred to as fairy tales/stories or folk tales/stories. The word tale comes from the Old English talu (story, tale), from the Old Germanic *talō, from the Proto-Indo-European root *del- (to recount, count), which is also the root of talk, tell, tall and teller, which arrived via Old Norse, as well as the Dutch word taal (speech), the German word zahl (number) and the Danish tale (speech) [source].

Scintillas of tinsel

By Simon

Tinsel

As there’s a lot of it about at this time of year, at least there is in the UK, I thought I’d investigate the origins of the word tinsel today.

According to the OED, tinsel probably comes from the Old French estincelle, which is also the root of the modern French étincelle (a sparke or sparkle of fire, a flash), from the popular Latin *stincilla, which is related to scintilla (spark).

One definition of tinsel in the OED is “very thin plates or sheets, spangles, strips, or threads, originally of gold or silver, later of copper, brass, or some gold- or silver-coloured alloy, used chiefly for ornament; now esp. for cheap and showy ornamentation, gaudy stage costumes, anglers’ flies, and the like”

According to Wikipedia, tinsel was originally made of strands of silver, was invented in Nuremberg around 1610, and was used to adorn sculptures at first, then later to decorate Christmas trees, particularly to enhance the light of the candles on the trees. During the 20th century other materials were used to make tinsel, including copper, aluminiumised paper and lead foil. These days it’s usually made of PVC film coated with a metallic finish.

Is your house currently festooned with tinsel and other decorations?

Gala

By Simon

Last week I went to an event described as a ‘gala concert’ at Bangor University. A friend asked what gala actually means; I wasn’t sure, so decided to find out.

According to the OED, gala (/ˈgaːlə/, /ˈgeɪlə/) means “gala dress, festal attire”; “a festive occasion; a festival characterized by the display of finery and show” or “festive, gay” (chiefly North America). It comes from the French word gala (official reception).

According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, gala comes from the French en gala, which perhaps comes from the Old French gale (merriment), from galer (rejoice, make merry).

Shaking paillasses

By Simon

In French une paillasse /pajas/ is a straw mattress, draining board or laboratory bench and un paillasse is a clown. The former is a combination of paille (straw) plus the suffix -asse. Paille comes from the Latin palea, from the Ancient Greek πάλλω (pallo = to shake) because you have to shake the straw to extract the grain. The latter comes from the Italian pagliaccio (clown).

The word paillasse /ˈpalɪas/, meaning a straw mattress, is also used in English and was used in Scots.

Paillasse also appears in des pommes (de terre) paillasses, a potato-based dish which came up in a quiz yesterday.

Sources: Wiktionnaire, OED, Reverso

Dros ben llestri

By Simon

The Welsh idiom, dros ben llestri (literally, “over (the) dishes/crockery”), means ‘over the top’, as in excessive, exaggerated or beyond reasonable limits. The phrase dros ben on its own means “residual, spare; extra, extremely, indeed, over”. I’m not sure how this phrase came to be associated with exaggeration.

In French there are a number of ways to express the same concept:
– (être) exagéré / trop / délirant(e) = (to be) over the top (excessive)
– encenser = to go over the top (praise excessively)
– en faire trop / en faire des tonnes / aller trop loin / dépasser les bornes = to go over the top (do sth excessively)

encenser also means ‘to praise by burning incense (l’encens)’.

Here are a few examples of usage:

– Votre réaction est exagérée = Their reaction was well over the top
= Mi aeth eu ymateb dros ben llestri

– L’Eurovision, c’est vraiment trop ! = Eurovision is so fantastically over the top
= Mae Eurovision yn hollol dros ben llestri

– Cette fois, il dépasse vraiment les bornes ! = This time he’s really gone too far / over the top!
= Y tro ‘ma, mae o ‘di mynd dros ben llestri yn wir.

The English expression over the top first appeared in print in 1965, and the acronym OTT made its first appearance in 1982 in the Official Sloane Ranger Handbook, according to the OED.

Sources: WordReference.com, OED

How do you express the same idea in other languages?

Tables, chairs, stools and cathedrals

By Simon

The Russian word for table (the piece of furniture) is стол (/stol/) which sounds a bit like stool in English. In most other Slavic languages the words for table are simliar: стол (Belarusian), stol (Croatian), stůl (Czech), stolŭ (Old Church Slavonic = throne, seat), stół (Polish), сто (Serbian), stôl (Slovak) and стіл (Ukrainian). Although in Bulgarian and Macedonian стол means chair and table is маса (masa), and in Slovenian a table is miza and chair is stol.

The Russian for chair is стул (/stul/), which sounds even more like stool, and stool is табуретка (/taburʲetka/), which probably comes from the French word for stool, tabouret. The English word stool comes from the Old English stól (seat for one person), from the Proto-Germanic *stōlaz, probably from the Proto-Indo-European root *stō-/sta- (to stand). The Slavic words for table probably come from the same root.

Stool came to mean a small seat without arms or a back when the word chair was adopted from French, via the Middle English chaere/chaiere from the Old French chaëre from the Latin cathedra (seat), from the Greek καθέδρα (chair, especially the seat of a bishop, or a teacher’s or professor’s chair) from κατά (down) and ἑδ (sit). In modern French the word chaire means a pulpit or a university chair (professorship), while a normal chair that you sit on is a chaise.

The English word table comes from the the classical Latin word tabula (board, plank, writing/votive tablet, map, picture), and was influenced by the Anglo-Norman tabul/tabull (board, plank, writing table, picture). The origin of the Latin word tabula is uncertain.

Sources: OED, Reverso, Online Etymology Dictionary

Promenades, walks and rides

By Simon

In French the word promenade (f) /pʀɔm.nad/ can mean a walk: une promenade à pied; a drive: une promenade en voiture, or a (bicycle / horse / sleigh) ride: une promenade à velo / à cheval / en traîneau. You can also talk about going on une promenade en mer / en bateau (a boat trip), or if you going for une promenade à pied, you might follow un sentier de promenade (a footpath) with un sac à dos de promenade (daysack) on your back.

The verb that goes with promenade is faire (to do), so you might say je vais faire une promenade à velo = I’m going for a bike ride. Alternatively the verb (se) promener can be used to mean to go for a walk, ride or drive, and if it’s your fingers or gaze that are going the wandering, the construction to use is se promener sur.

Promenade comes from promener (to walk), from the Latin promenare (to drive (animals) onward) from prō (forth) plus minare (to drive (animals) with shouts), from minari (to threaten), from minae (threats), from the Proto-Indo-European root *men-.

In English promenade originally, in the 16th century, meant “a leisurely walk (ride or drive), especially one taken in a public place so as to meet or be seen by others.” and then was used to refer specifically to a place for taking a such a walk by the sea.

Sources: Online Etymology Dictionary, OED, myEtymology.com, Wiktionary

Striggles, sniggles and squiggles

By Simon

I came across the word striggle /ˈstrɪg(ə)l/ – a wavy line, while looking for something else in the OED. It’s a portmanteau of straggle and wiggle, and it caught my attention because I hadn’t encountered it before, and because it appeals to me.

Other words that look and sound like they’re related include squiggle (to work wavy or intricate embroidery, to squirm or wriggle, squirm); sniggle (to wriggle, crawl, creep stealthily; a snigger or snicker), and wriggle (to twist or turn the body about with short writhing movements; to move sinuously; to writhe, squirm, wiggle). The etymology of these is uncertain and they are perhaps of imitative origin, though apparently wriggle comes from the (Middle) Low German wriggeln, which comes from wriggen (to twist or turn).

Does the -iggle part of these words suggest anything to you in terms of size, shape, or other qualities?