Chemical elements are named for all sorts of reasons. Americium was named because it was discovered in the United States — there’s also Europium, named because it was discovered in Europe. Gallium is named after France (Gaul). Hassium is named after the German state Hesse, where it was discovered. There are loads of other examples,… Continue reading

Calling a magician a “prestidigitator” is not unusual — in fact, depending on the stage persona of the magician in question, “prestidigitator” might even be part of their act. It means “quick fingers,” as in “the hand is quicker than the eye,” and it comes from French, where it was the nearly-identical “prestidigitateur.” I bet… Continue reading

Annnnd…here’s the next installment! You’ll remember the Acrasy List, and that will, I’m sure, bring to mind its contrapositive companion, the erstwhile Nice List. But just a bit of scrutiny shows that “nice” has not always been a suitable sobriquet to apply to anyone you hold in the slightest esteem. “Nice” arrived in English from… Continue reading

Nowadays we talk about Santa’s two lists; the Naughty and the Nice. But it hasn’t always been that way. It’s not easy to find the clues, but The Truth Is Out There. Let’s start with “naughty.” “Naughty” comes from naught — no, that’s not quite right; it didn’t really pop up out of nothing. What… Continue reading

During the 1600s in England, a great many negative words were coined by adding the prefix “mis-.” That is, if you acknowledged someone or something, but then discovered you’d made a mistake, in those days you’d say you “misacknowledged.” There was also “missadd” in 1657 for summing poorly, misalter in 1641 for making an error… Continue reading

In 1699 Abel Boyer published a dictionary with the unusual characteristic of a three-sentence title: The royal dictionary. In two parts. First, French and English. Secondly, English and French. In that dictionary you can find this entry: “Pill-garlick: a pitiful sneaking Fellow out of Countenance.” It wasn’t long before “pill-garlick” became the word “pilgarlic.” It… Continue reading

Nowadays being “enthusiastic” is generally considered a good thing. It means you’re intensely interested in something (like a hobby), you enjoy it very much (like a piece of music), or you highly approve of it (like your favorite sports team). This hasn’t always been the case, though. “Enthusiasm” came from the Greek word “enthousiasmos,” which… Continue reading

“Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana.” (Groucho Marx) “We must, indeed, all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately.” (Benjamin Franklin) Those are examples of “antanaclasis,” which is repeating a word (or a phrase), and using it in a different sense the second time. The word comes from Latin,… Continue reading

Horatio Nelson, the famous British admiral, served in the Mediterranean Sea in the late 1700s, before the French Revolution. From 1799 to 1801 his flagship was the HMS Foudroyant. British warships are often named for admirable qualities, like the HMS Resolute or HMS Victory, and the Foudroyant was no different, even though few people would… Continue reading

When a craftsperson, artist, musician, or writer manages to fit a set of components together to make a congruous, harmonious whole, there used to be a word for it. Well, of course, there still are words for it — after all, I just used “congruous” and “harmonious.” And “consistency” and “elegance” could be added as… Continue reading