We’re all familiar with the word stamina, meaning “strength to resist, endurance.” But did you know that it comes from the Latin word for “threads”?
The Latin, in turn, is from the Greek stemon…a thread. Specifically, the thread that the three Fates spun, measured out, and snipped for each human life. If someone had a long life–exhibiting fortitude and endurance and resistance to the bad things that could end said life early–they were thought to have long “threads of life.” Much stamina.
And just as a bonus–if you haven’t brushed up on your Greek mythology lately, LOL, the three fates are Clotho (the one who spun the threads), Lachesis (the one who measured it out), and Atropos (the one who cuts it).
Roseanna M. White is a bestselling, Christy Award winning author who has long claimed that words are the air she breathes. When not writing fiction, she’s homeschooling her two kids, editing, designing book covers, and pretending her house will clean itself. Roseanna is the author of a slew of historical novels that span several continents and thousands of years. Spies and war and mayhem always seem to find their way into her books…to offset her real life, which is blessedly ordinary.