by Roseanna White | Sep 22, 2014 | Word of the Week
So, my husband made what I deem an incredible etymology discovery this weekend. That isle and island are completely unrelated words, from different roots.
Color me baffled.
The world island was originally spelled yland, and appeared in 1590…to replace the Old English igland. This spelling is taken from ieg, a word influenced by Proto-Germanic, which means “thing on the water” LOL.
The spelling changed from yland to island in 1590, however, because of the word isle.
Isle is from the French isle, which in turn traces its roots to the Latin insula. So, the same meaning, but one Latin root and one German, and they sounded the same…hence, I suppose, why ye Older English folk decided to spell them the same too. Thereby confusing the following generations into thinking them indelibly related. 😉
by Roseanna White | Sep 15, 2014 | Word of the Week
We all know what level means, right? It’s to be even, going neither up nor down. It’s the state of being so, like the levels of a house. It’s the tool that guarantees it. And all the idioms containing it arise from those. Sure.
But I was quite surprised to learn that the tool is the chronologically first meaning! The English word for such a tool dates from the mid-1300s, taken from the French livel, which comes in turn from the Latin libella — “scale, balance, unit of weight.” The meaning of “horizontally” followed in about 1400, and the line indicated by such a measure in 1530. The phrase on the level originally didn’t mean “honest and fair”–it meant “moderate, without great ambition.” I had no clue about that one!
The adjective, which I would have assumed to be the oldest definition, didn’t in face come along until the early 15th century. Which, granted, is still stinkin’ old, LOL. But it’s still at least 50 years after the noun, possibly as many as a hundred. The verb followed within another half-century.
Most of the familiar idioms still in use today (level off, level with me…) date from the 1920s. Level off is, not surprisingly, from aviation.
by Roseanna White | Sep 8, 2014 | Word of the Week
In case you haven’t heard yet, Love Finds You in Annapolis, Maryland is on sale until September 15! All digital versions are only $0.99, which is a waaaaaaaay lower price than it’s usual $8+. If you were waiting for the right time to get this one, it’s here. =)
Amazon |
Barnes and Noble |
ChristianBook.com |
iTunes
But as I was promoting the start of the sale while on vacation last week, I realized that I honestly couldn’t even remember parts of this book, LOL. I hadn’t read it since a few months before its release in fall of 2011, so I though, “Hey, I’m on vacation–I’m not working on anything else. Why not?” So I sat down and became reacquainted with Lark and Emerson and Wiley, with Edwinn and Sena and Kate and Alice.
And I also remembered one of my fun word finds. I mentioned it in a Remember When Wednesday post way back in January 2011, but I thought it deserved its own Word of the Week.
It started from wanting to describe a passel of boys on Christmas as rambunctious. The problem being that rambunctious wasn’t created until 1859–and this book is set in 1783. But etymonline.com helpfully pointed out that rambunctious was a later form of rumbunctious… though even that was from 1830. Still no help for me!
But!
Rumbunctious is in turn a variation on a word from 1778–
rumbustious. Etymologists don’t seem entirely certain of the origins on this word, but they suggest that it’s a combination of “rum +
boisterous,
robustious,
bumptious.” And it worked for me! I figured it was close enough to rambunctious that no one would wonder at its meaning, but it also gave a certain something to the tone. =)
Of course, vacation is now over, and it’s back to the grind of school and editing for me and mine. But no fears–I’ve got some beach-inspired musings planned for later this week. 😉
by Roseanna White | Aug 25, 2014 | Word of the Week
My kids made me look this one up the other day, wondering if pig and pigment were related…giving that Xoe’s been studying base words and prefixes and suffixes, this is a logical question. =)
So away to www.etymonline.com I went. To discover that, as I suspected, no. Pigment is not from the same root as pig.
Pigment, as it happens, comes from the pigmentum, meaning “color matter, paint.” Pretty much what I expected. It comes in turn from the Latin verb pingere, meaning “to paint.”
Pig, on the other hand, has obscure roots. It existed in Old English, but the experts think it might have been borrowed from the German or Dutch word for swine, which was big/bigge. They seem to agree that it was originally spelled with a B.
Interestingly, some of the nicknames for a pig–porker, grunter–came about because sailors’ superstitions forbade them from uttering the word “pig” while at sea! Can’t say as I knew that one, LOL.
Happy Monday!
by Roseanna White | Aug 11, 2014 | Word of the Week
An always-hot topic in Christian writing circles is the use of foul language. Is it ever okay in Christian fiction? Some words? What about others? Why or why not?
I have my own opinions on such things–namely, I don’t use “bad language” but see no point in getting up in arms about those who do–but I find some of the distinctions very interesting.
What I definitely take issue with is profanity. Profane comes directly from the Latin profanus, which means “unholy.” Profanity obviously is taken from profane, and it speaks directly to abusing/misusing the name of the Lord. So your average expletive is not profanity. And in fact, the original English translations of the Bible include words that today’s Christians would probably raise a few eyebrows at, LOL.
Expletive just means exclamation…cuss is a variation on curse…
So then I jump to curse, thinking surely that this word will provide some good meaning. But curse has its roots, oddly enough, in, you know, a curse. As in “a prayer that evil will befall one.” That’s not exactly what modern cursing is either, is it? LOL
Looking at the etymology of these words themselves, it seems that our notion of bad language has just evolved over the centuries. “Rough” or “impolite” terms have slowly taken on the blight of being “bad.” From “bad” they have become “cursing and profanity”…though in reality, most of them I’ve ever heard have nothing to do with actual curses or profaning the name of the Lord.
I still don’t say them, because connotation means as much as denotation. But looking at it logically, I think the only things that strictly fall under these definitions are using the Lord’s name in vain and wishing somebody be damned. Which, oddly, are two of the more acceptable ones. Oh, the irony…
by Roseanna White | Aug 4, 2014 | Word of the Week
Hi is one of those greetings that feels new to me, and which I usually avoid entirely in my historicals…though I’ve seen it in a few others. And so, I look it up.
It isn’t quite as new as I’d thought–as a greeting like it’s used today, hi is from 1862 (though let it be noted it’s American English from then, not British). The first recorded reference is from the speech of a Kansas Indian.
It traces its roots further back, though. As a shout to gain attention (so not just a substitute for hello or good day), it’s from the 15th century, as a variation of hey.
On another note, today is the last day to enter the giveaway on the Harvest House blog to win Circle of Spies! Hop over to read my guest post about the Culper Ring and enter to win! Click Here
Cylist photo credit: -Jeffrey- via photopin
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.