Rob's Sporadic Etymology Lesson

[Rob]

Etymology: Middle English ethimologie, from Anglo-French, from Latin etymologia, from Greek, from etymon + -logia -logy

The history of a linguistic form (as a word) shown by tracing its development since its earliest recorded occurrence in the language where it is found, by tracing its transmission from one language to another, by analyzing it into its component parts, by identifying its cognates in other languages, or by tracing it and its cognates to a common ancestral form in an ancestral language.

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Etymology is a fascinating subject. To know and understand the origin of a word not only satisfies a certain curiosity one might have but also contributes to a fuller comprehension of the world generally; it educates; it elucidates.

For the benefit and pleasure of those who enjoy this sort of thing, I will sporadically post the etymologies of certain words in this thread. Yes, it is off-topic; so sue me.

[Rob]

Sugar; Candy; Caramel

Sugar; Candy; Caramel

“All come from the Greek saccharon and the Roman saccharum, which are both distortions of the Sanskrit sarkara. Around the year 1000, after conquering a good portion of the southern Mediterranean, the Arabs installed the first ‘industrial’ sugar refinery on the island of Crete, which they renamed Qandi, which in Arabic means ‘crystallized sugar.’ This is how the word ‘candy’ made its way into English. Shortly thereafter, the Arabs also invented ‘caramel,’ which comes from the Arabic phrase kurat al milh and means ‘ball of sweet salt.’”—Etymologically Speaking

“The English word ‘sugar’ ultimately originates from the Sanskrit word sharkara or śarkarā which means ‘sugar’ or ‘pebble’. It probably came to English by way of the French, Spanish and/or Italians who derived their word for sugar from the Arabic al sukkar (whence the Spanish word azúcar, the Old Italian word zucchero, the Old French word zuchre). The Arabs in turn derived their word from the Persian shakar, derived from the original Sanskrit.”—Wikipedia

[billyjoe]

Rob,

I took Latin in high school and college ,but was outdone by my friends who went to the Catholic high school. We insulted each other in Latin calling each other Manus--meaning hand and I won't say the rest of it. Funny , those are the things I remember.

------------billyjoe

[Rob]

Heal; Health; Healthy

“The story of ‘healthy,’ ‘health’ and ‘heal’ all begins way back with the Proto-Germanic root word ‘khailaz,’ which meant literally ‘to make whole,’ and which also eventually gave us our English word ‘whole.’ Old English had the derivative ‘haelan,’ which also meant ‘to make whole’ with the added sense of ‘to make well,’ and which ultimately gave us the English verb ‘to heal.’ The word ‘health’ followed a similar path, adding an abstract suffix to denote ‘the condition of being well and sound.’ From there, ‘healthy’ meaning ‘possessing good health’ was a snap.

“So ‘healthy,’ ‘health’ and ‘heal’ all spring from the same source, and are every bit as closely related as they appear. There are also, of course, ‘healthful’ and the slightly rarer ‘healthsome,’ both meaning ‘promoting or conducive to bodily health; health-giving, wholesome, salubrious.’ A few years ago, I received an extremely irate letter from a reader who was apoplectic that I had used the phrase ‘healthy food’ when, he declared, I obviously meant ‘healthful.’ The problem, as is so often the case when finer points of usage are debated, is that ‘healthy’ has also meant ‘conducive to or promoting health’ since at least 1552, so that particular boat sailed a long time ago, and getting that worked up over it cannot be healthy.”—The Word Detective, July 5, 2006

[Rob]

The Term "Buck" As Used for "Dollar"

“Though some believe that the term buck for an American dollar originated from the use of silver dollars for bucks ‘markers used in poker,’ others believe that the term buck ‘dollar’ originated due to the fact that buckskins were used in trade, as a form of money, in early America. The term buck was then transferred to currency. If that is the case, then the buck used in poker got its name from the buck ‘dollar’ used as a marker in the game. Unfortunately, no one knows the true answer with certainty.

“The etymology of buck as in buckskin is this: the term bucke ‘male goat’ (probably from before 1200), which came from Old English bucca ‘male goat’ (before 830), was applied around 1300 to mean ‘male deer.’ By that time it was spelled bocke, but then the spelling reverted to bucke (around 1375), and later the e was dropped. Old English bucca is derived from Indo-European bukkan. There are cognates of buck in languages like Sanskrit, Armenian, Avestan, and Old Irish.”—Take Our Word for It

[Jim Smith]

the term Buck

I was told by a history professor that the term "buck" came from the fact the a dearskin fetched a buck on the market.

[billyjoe]

Rob,
I always thought the word "nerd" was created by the Happy Days television show. Never heard the word before the show and couldn't find anyone else around here who did either. Apparently it was used in other parts of the country. Anyone remember using the word "nerd" before the late 1970's.

---------------billyjoe

[Rob]

Nerd

Billy, from the Wikipedia page on "nerd":

The term "nerd", meaning "square", goes back at least to 1951, when Newsweek reported the usage as relatively new in Detroit, Michigan. By the 1960s, it took on connotations of bookishness as well as social ineptitude. The word itself first appeared in Dr. Seuss's book If I Ran the Zoo, published in 1950, where it simply names one of Seuss's many comical imaginary animals. (The narrator Gerald McGrew claims that he would collect "a Nerkle, a Nerd, and a Seersucker too" for his imaginary zoo.[citation needed]) Another theory of the word's origin sees it as a variation on Mortimer Snerd, the name of Edgar Bergen's ventriloquist dummy. Yet another theory traces the term to Northern Electric Research and Development, suggesting images of employees wearing pocket protectors with the acronym N.E.R.D. printed on them.

There's more. I just cut and pasted the first few sentences under History.

[billyjoe]

Rob,
Here are some words of unknown origin and the first date of recorded useage from www.musanim.com . I find the Jazz and related words dates of origin very interesting.

bozo--1920-----------------moola--1939
conniption--1922------------nifty---1868
dippy--1922-----------------pimp---1526
dude--1883-----------------pizzazz--1937
dweeb--1983----------------punk---1596
fink--1928-------------------simoleon-1903
flabbergast--1772------------slang---1756
freak--1563------------------stooge--1913
gizmo--1943------------------twerp--1923
grungy--1965-----------------surf----1685
jazz--1918--------------------zit-----1966
jive--1928
lollapalooza--unknown

-------------billyjoe

[jiesen]

http://www.worldwidewords.org/weirdwords/ww-sim1.htm

the word "simoleon" was in use in 1883...

[Rob]

Stock Market/Stock

“stock market
“place where securities are bought and sold, 1809, from stock (n.2) + market. [The original ‘Stock Market’ (c.1350) was a fish and meat market in the City of London on or near the later site of Mansion House, so called perhaps because it occupied the site of a former stocks.]”—Online Etymology Dictionary

“stock (n.2)
“‘supply for future use’ (142, ‘sum of money’ (1463), M.E. developments of stock (n.1), but the ultimate sense connection is uncertain. Perhaps the notion is of the ‘trunk’ from which gains are an outgrowth, or obs. sense of ‘money-box’ (c.1400). Meaning ‘subscribed capital of a corporation’ is from 1612. Stock-broker is from 1706; stock exchange is from 1773. The verb meaning ‘to supply (a store) with stock’ is from 1622; in stock ‘in the possession of a trader’ is from 1618. Meaning ‘broth made by boiling meat or vegetables’ is from 1764. Theatrical use, in ref. to a company regularly acting together at a given theater, is attested from 1761. In ref. to conversation or literature, ‘recurring, commonplace’ (e.g. stock phrase), it is attested from 1738, on notion of ‘kept in store for constant use.’ Taking stock ‘making an inventory’ is attested from 1736. As the collective term for the movable property of a farm, it is recorded from 1519; hence livestock (1523).”—ibid.

[Rob]

“Bull” and “Bear” Markets

“The precise origin of the phrases ‘bull market’ and ‘bear market’ is obscure. The most common etymology points to London bearskin ‘jobbers’ (brokers), who would sell bearskins before the bears had actually been caught in contradiction of the proverb ne vendez pas la peau de l'ours avant de l’avoir tué (‘don't sell the bearskin before you've killed the bear’)—an admonition against over-optimism. By the time of the South Sea Bubble of 1721, the bear was also associated with short selling; jobbers would sell bearskins they did not own in anticipation of falling prices, which would enable them to buy them later for an additional profit.

“Some analogies that have been drawn, but are likely false etymologies:

• It relates to the common use of these animals in bloodsport, i.e bear-baiting and bull-baiting.
• It refers to the way that the animals attack: a bull attacks with its horns from bottom up; a bear attacks with its paw from above, downward.
• It relates to the speed of the animals: bulls usually charge at very high speed whereas bears normally are lazy and cautious movers.
• They were originally used in reference to two old merchant banking families, the Barings and the Bulstrodes.
• Bears hibernate, while Bulls do not.
• Bears keep their chin up, while Bulls keep their chin down.
• Bear neck points down while Bull's points upwards.

“Another plausible origin is from the word ‘bulla’ which means bill, or contract. When a market is rising, holders of contracts for future delivery of a commodity see the value of their contract increase. In a falling market, the counterparties--the ‘bearers’ of the commmodity to be delivered, win because they have locked in a price higher than the present for future deivery.”—Wikipedia

[ParkTwain]

What I have read: The bear shows its power when it strikes downward with its paws. The bull shows its power when it gores with an upward thrust.

[lemonjello]

Rob,

That's interesting. Wonder when bear skins were the fashion? Were Milan, Paris and London the centers of bear skin fashion?

I remember reading the beaver skins were in high demand at one point and John Jacob Astor was the Warren Buffet of beaver. Being in the middle of a beaver market wouldn't sound so bad.

“The precise origin of the phrases ‘bull market’ and ‘bear market’ is obscure. The most common etymology points to London bearskin ‘jobbers’ (brokers), who would sell bearskins before the bears had actually been caught in contradiction of the proverb ne vendez pas la peau de l'ours avant de l’avoir tué (‘don't sell the bearskin before you've killed the bear’)—an admonition against over-optimism. By the time of the South Sea Bubble of 1721, the bear was also associated with short selling; jobbers would sell bearskins they did not own in anticipation of falling prices, which would enable them to buy them later for an additional profit.

“Some analogies that have been drawn, but are likely false etymologies:

• It relates to the common use of these animals in bloodsport, i.e bear-baiting and bull-baiting.
• It refers to the way that the animals attack: a bull attacks with its horns from bottom up; a bear attacks with its paw from above, downward.
• It relates to the speed of the animals: bulls usually charge at very high speed whereas bears normally are lazy and cautious movers.
• They were originally used in reference to two old merchant banking families, the Barings and the Bulstrodes.
• Bears hibernate, while Bulls do not.
• Bears keep their chin up, while Bulls keep their chin down.
• Bear neck points down while Bull's points upwards.

“Another plausible origin is from the word ‘bulla’ which means bill, or contract. When a market is rising, holders of contracts for future delivery of a commodity see the value of their contract increase. In a falling market, the counterparties--the ‘bearers’ of the commmodity to be delivered, win because they have locked in a price higher than the present for future deivery.”—Wikipedia

[Rob]

That's interesting. Wonder when bear skins were the fashion? Were Milan, Paris and London the centers of bear skin fashion?

I don't know, Jello, but it stands to reason that in the old days, when all woven fabrics were made by hand, bearskins would probably have been a less expensive way to keep warm.

The thing that interests me at the moment is that the text in the bullet points of my original post was not italicized in the quote portion of your reply.