Etymology of Doom

The etymology of doom reveals a lot about the complicated relationship that mankind has had with the concepts of law and judgement throughout history. The modern sense of the term has been associated with implications of fear and ruin since the early 1600s. Originally, however, doom is rooted in the Proto-Indo-European dhe-, meaning "to put or set" and has been used for a variety of words associated with "law" throughout linguistic history.

In Old English, doom was used to refer to law and judgement, and the term dombec stood for a book of laws. Over the century, doom became increasingly associated with the final judgement at the end of days prophesied by the Christian tradition. The finality of that judgement and the fear associated with the day of reckoning eventually evolved into the modern sense of doom that we use today.

Etymology of Monster

Following yesterday's etymology of money and its curious relationship to a warning from the gods, I spent a little bit of time before work this morning looking over some other similar words that have related roots. As the second part of what might be a series of posts on this dysfunctional family of divinely rooted words, the etymology of monster gives us a good picture of what we might be getting into here. The final Latin root for monster is monstrum, meaning "an omen, supernatural being or object that is an omen or warning of the will of the gods." Monstrum, as it turns out, is derived from monere, "to warn or to advise, particularly in a divine sense," and the same root as money.

Monster entered the English language between the 12th and 14th centuries from the Old French term monstre, and it appears the monstre was used in Middle English as either an evil omen or frightening physical deformity well into modern English when it became monster. One of the earliest examples of monstre being used in the sense that it is used today appeared in 1385 in Chaucer's Legend of Good Women when discussing a minotaur that inhabits the underworld:

This Mynos hadde a monstre, a wiked best,
That was so crewel that, withoute arest,
Whan that a man was brought in his presence,
He wolde hym ete; ther helpeth no defence.

Monster came to also mean huge or enormous around 1500 and soon came to describe things that were figuratively absurd, such as a particularly disturbing thought. While the original meaning of monstrum as an omen is no longer present in the modern monster, this sense lingers on in words derived from the OF and ME monstre like premonition, demonstrate and muster, which will be the target for another related posting somewhere down the line.

Etymology of Money

Given the complicated relationship that most people have with money and the dramatic influence that money has over so many aspects of human life, it is hard to dismiss the synchronicity of the original meaning of the Latin root: warning.

The word money can be traced back to one of the earliest Roman mints, a temple devoted to Juno Regina located on top of one of the seven hills of Rome, Capitoline Hill. In Roman mythology, Juno was Jupiter's wife and considered to be the patron goddess of Rome. Like other Roman gods and godesses, Juno had a number of different epithets, which can best be understood as aspects of a divinity that represented particular roles, essences and/or locations associated with the being.

One of Juno's epithets was Juno Moneta, who was responsible with protecting Roman's financial stability. The name Moneta is derived from the Latin monēre, which mean "to warn or advise," and Juno Moneta is cited as warning Rome of impending danger on multiple occasions. Depending on which etymologist or historian you believe, the Latin moneta had already come to mean minted coin by the time that her temple became a mint or the temple was used to coin money in deference to Juno Moneta's assistance with previous financial matters.

The most likely story in my opinion is that coins from the Juno Moneta temple came to be referred to generically as moneta, which eventually became the root of the primary word for money in many languages, and the Moneta temple became shortened for anywhere money was minted. Monitor and admonish is one of the few English words that use the earliest meaning of the root as a warning or advice.

There is actually quite a bit more to this story that I will try to follow up on another post soon. Oddly enough, monera can be trace back even further, and the words money, mind, memory and more. There is also something to be said for an alternate history in which money is related to various words meaning single and unique (monarch, mono- , etc) that we might be able to tie into all of this. Rather than going down that rabbit hole just yet, let's just take the Moneta temple up through the present. Well after moneta had come to simply mean cash, it entered Old French as monnaie where it eventually entered Middle English around the 13th century as moneie and, finally, money.

Etymology of Slogan

During the latter half of the 20th century, a brand's slogan was considered to be the hallmark of a successful advertising campaign. The modern sense of the word appeared in the early 20th century when commercial industries began manufacturing desire in consumers for products that they initially neither wanted nor needed. Prior to the dawn of modern advertising, a slogan was used to denote any type of catchphrase that an organization, political party or powerful family might adopt during the 18th and 19th century. Despite the mild modern sense of the word, however, slogan first entered our language as a war cry with roots that are deeply rooted in Gaelic military history.

The word slogan is derived from the Gaelic term sluaghghairm, which can be parsed as sluagh for 'army' and ghairm for 'shout.' In the moments before Gaelic warriors faced off with a sworn enemy, a unit of soldiers would shout their particular sluaghghairm at the top of their lungs as they rushed toward the field of battle with their weapons at the ready. The two-fold purpose of a sluaghghairm was to inspire terror in the enemy while creating a bolstering, fearless sense of camaraderie in the final moments leading up to inevitable bloodshed.

Sluaghghairm entered the English language as slogan during the 15th century where it was used for the next 300 years to delineate certain military war cries. The British Empire in particular became very fond of assigning military slogans to various units or battles, such as "Don't give up the ship!" or "God save the Queen!" In North America, the Apache war cry "Geronimo!" or the American refrain of "Remember the Alamo!" during the Mexican American war are two excellent examples of more recent military slogans.

For information on military slogans and battle cries, check out 100 Decisive Battles: From Ancient Times to the Present

Etymology of Galoshes

Galoshes. The name for those cheerful rubber boots that children have enjoyed wearing while jumping in fresh rain puddles for generations has a surprisingly ethnic origin that can be traced back to prehistoric Germanic.

Before the rubber overshoes that we are familiar with today appeared on the market, galoshes were a type of wooden shoe or sandal. The Oxford English Dictionary maintains that a galosh was originally a generic term for any type of shoe or boot. The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology holds that the term entered the English language during the 1300s as a type of footwear, with earlier variations including galoches, galleys and galegs. By the middle of the 14th century, Galocher began appearing as a surname for individuals and families that made galoshes. The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology suggests that galoshes may have entered the English language from the Old French galoche, which was derived from the Vulgar Latin *galopia and the Greek kalopodion. If this is the case, then the final root of galoshes is most likely the Indo-European *keu-.

However, the majority of the other reference materials point to a decidedly different etymology of galoshes. The prevailing opinion outside of the OED seems to be that galoshes were originally a type of wooden clog that were worn by the Gauls when the Romans invaded and conquered the area. The term Gaul itself seems to be rooted in a prehistoric Germanic word that referred to “outsider, foreigner,” and the galoshes referred to the wooden shoes of the Gauls. These shoes were a type of overshoe that allowed an owner to simply slip their feet into while they were still wearing their indoor shoes.

Galoshes did not begin being used to refer to rubber boots that are designed to be worn over regular shoes until the 19th century. While they appear to have started appearing in great numbers in England during the 20th century, I've yet to figure out exactly how the rubber version of this overshoe was named or marketed.

Etymology of Hokey Pokey

While most English speakers are familiar with the term hokey pokey as the popular children’s song and dance that first appeared during the middle of the 20th century. However, hokey pokey has been present in our lexicon for well over a century as the name of cheap type of fake ice cream. Hokey pokey itself the anglicized version of the mock Latin hocus-pocus that was used by stage performers like jugglers and magicians for some centuries.

The nonsense term hocus-pocus is derived from the Medieval Latin root of joke, jocus, meaning a jest or a verbal game. In time, jocus was developed into joke, jocular and juggler, and it was jugglers that appear to have first coined the term hocus-pocus in order to deflect the attention of the audience while they performed a sleight of hand. Although there were a few variations, the most common version of this bit of verbal stagecraft appears to have been:

“Hocus-pokus, toutus talontus, vade celerita jubes.”

Hocus was shortened to hoax during the 1790s to describe any type of trick that was designed to convince something false or preposterous was real. In about 1847, vendors began selling ice cream from small displays that soon became known as hokey pokey carts. Customers referred to the ice cream as hokey pokey due to the absurdly small servings that the vendors would sell to local children. According to one account, the hokey pokey man would sell kids a few different flavors of ice cream at roughly a tablespoon per penny on small pieces of newsprint. When the Great Depression developed during the 1930s, vendors began selling a face version of the treat consisting of shaved ice flavored with syrup.

Today, hokey pokey is a specific flavor of ice cream that is primarily confined to New Zealand and Scotland. Modern hokey pokey ice cream consists of vanilla ice cream that has been flavored with chunks of solid or sponge toffee. The Hokey Pokey (or Hokey Cokey) song appears to have originated in the 1940s as a 20th century spin on traditional Scottish participative dances. Although the modern version of the song does not directly refer to its roots, the song was allegedly inspired by a hokey pokey man who sang to customers in a sing-song voice:

"Hokey pokey penny a lump. Have a lick make you jump."

Etymology of Calendar

Etymology of Calendar

When reading a news story this morning about a dispute between Iran and the United Kingdom over an ancient artifact known as the Cyrus Cylinder (a stone document that appears to represent the first recorded human rights charter), I happened to notice how closely the words "calendar" and "cylinder" resembled one another. Given that the Cyrus Cylinder was engraved in an actual cylinder, I got to wondering whether this was just a coincidence or what. As it turns out, it depends on whose story you decide to take.

The history of the word in Origins, an etymological dictionary of English from Eric Partridge, seems to give credence to the notion that the two terms are very closely related. According to this particular etymology, "calendar" indeed shares its origins with the term "cylinder," both of which can be traced back the Greek kulinros/kulindein, "to roll," on back to the Sanskrit kundam, meaning a round container or a round whole, stemming from the IndoEuropean kel- "to curve or bend." However, there is no indication here as to just what was so cylindrical about calendars to explain what is going on here.

The more popular etymology of calendar pretty much shot my theory to bits. I don't have access to a proper Oxford dictionary today, but the general notes in my home dictionary and the basic etymology sites online all tell a very different story about the history of the term "calendar." In a nut shell, the consensus is that the word calendar derived from the protoindoeuropeansuarusrex kele- meaning to shout out. When debts were due at the beginning of every month, lender and accountants would call off the debts from their calendarium, or account book, which this history holds was named after the calling of debts to be reckoned. The first day of the month in the Roman calendar was called Kalendae, and it is generally assumed that the word "calendar" was eventually derived from the most important day that the calendar was used for: paying the bills.

However, I'm not entirely convinced that the etymology in Origins is wrong. For one thing, there is a very similar word "calender" that is used to name a machine that rolls smooth bounds of cloth or paper through the use of, you guessed it, cylinders. Next, all of the ancient calendars that I have been able to find information on where round in shape, from the Mayan calendar to the rocks on Stone Henge. This is pure conjecture, but it seems more likely that day Kalendae would refer to when the monthly cycle was renewed than the other way around. If this is the case, Kalendae would seem to fit right in with the etymology of cylinder discussed above. If this is true, I think that it would be safe to say that the generally accepted etymology about solemn announcement of monthly debts.

I'm tempted to keep belaboring this point because, well, I'm right, damn it. Instead, though, I'll just say that this is an excellent example of how open ended etymology really. Many of the word origins indicated in general reference texts are based as much on folk wisdom than scholarly research. The words we used today may have been passed down to us through the centuries, but their histories have almost been obscured along the way. As a result, nearly every word in our language carries a hidden and half forgotten story of who we were and where we've come from

and scene.

Etymology of Punk and Spunk

The term "spunk" originated in the early 1600's in the British Isles meaning "a spark," having been adopted from the Gaelic spong for "tinder," which in turn comes from the Latin spongia. The Latin appears to be derived from how closely the popular kindling touchwood resembles natural sponges. "Spunk" became a colloquial term for courage and pluck in the late 18th century, assumably with the sense that the person showed some spark of life. The vulgar use of the term appeared about a century ago and is rarely used in this sense outside of the United Kingdom.

As it turns out, it appears likely that "spunk" shares a similar etymology with "punk," although the former had a decidedly less positive sense until recently. The term "punk" fist appears in the United States just before the turn of the 19th century to mean "inferior, bad or worthless," having been used formerly to denote low quality wood that was not good for anything other than kindling. Shortly into the 20th century, young adults and children were described as "punk kids" who became hoodlums and were of essentially worthless in the eyes of productive society.

It's also interesting to note that both the terms "punk" and "fagot" were originally used to describe low quality would meant for kindling...

Notes: There's actually a couple other etymologies out there for "punk" out there, but this is the only one I could find shows a clear evolution of the terms over recent history. Also, I seem to recall that they used to pack fireworks with a slow burning stick called a "punk" that was used to light fuses, but I haven't taken the time to double check on that one.

Etymology of Hunky-dory

According to William and Mary Morris's 1967 Dictionary of Word and Phrases, the decidedly dorky colloquilism "hunky-dory" is probably rooted in the slang used at a Dutch settlement in New Amsterdam where hunk was close to the Dutch word honk, meaning goal.

However, the following story behind the term "everything's hunky dory" is decidedly more entertaining, even if it probably isn't actually true. In Yokahama, Kapan, the principal street that sailor's on shore leave kept an eye for to keep from getting lost was called Hunchodori Street. So long as sailor wandering around knew where to find Hunchodori Street, he knew he could find his way back to the ship.

A similar version of this history of "hunky dory" is that the term honcho-dori means the equivalent of main street for towns that have one. U.S. Sailors may have developed the habit of asking for directions using a bastardization of the word when in any number of cities.

The term has been in use in the english language since the middle of the 19th Century.

http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/hunky-dory.html
http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-hun2.htm

Etymology of Rhododendron

cue the trumpets

I always thought that the name of this hillside brush sounded like the name of a dinosaur or evil comic book character. Rhododendron, Eater of Souls, or something like that. Sadly the etymology of rhododendron is disappointingly boring. It hasn't changed from the original L. rhododendron, meaning "rose tree."

Eymology of Paparazzi

The term paparazzi orginated in the Fellini's 1960 film, La Dolce Vita, after the photographer character named Paparazzo. The name was probably rooted in an older Italian term, papariare, meaning to "wander about wasting time," but it remains unclear where exactly Fellini came up with the name. The term was used in the media to refer to photographers in Time article the following year.


Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paparazzi
http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=paparazzi
http://podictionary.com/?p=817
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,872287,00.html