Linguistics Stack Exchange
Linguistics Stack Exchange

Questions tagged [etymology]

The study of the history of words including their origins and the changes they've undergone through time.

Etymology helps understanding the historical development of word forms and meanings, it does not define the current meaning of a word. This phenomenon is known as Etymological fallacy.

There are a lot of etymology resources online, e.g., Wiktionary. Those are helpful in answering single word etymologies. Use them before asking here.

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Animals’ names change when we eat them: is that universal?

I rebound off a question asked on French Language & Usage: in many languages, some designations for animal meats (in its raw, uncooked and uncured form) differ from the live animal's name itself. Examples in various languages include: in English:…
F'x
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Connection between right (opposite of left) and right (legal term)?

Does anyone know of a connection, or some sort of established historical/etymological explanation why in a few languages, "the opposite of left" and "legal term" are the same or seemingly related words? Do they all have a common root? Did they…
Rafael Emshoff
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Is Slavic [zima] ("winter") derived from "snow"?

I was wondering why Thai word for "snow" was sounding similar to Slavic word for "winter": Thai: หิมะ [hì-má] "snow" Ukrainian: зима [ˈzɪ-mə] "winter" Polish: zima [ˈʑi-ma] "winter" Also, "Himalaya" हिमालय [himā-laya] is commonly referred as…
Be Brave Be Like Ukraine
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Is there any link between the word 'eight' and the word 'night'?

When writing a text message with my phone, I often write "good n8" to say good night. Yet, I notice that this could also work in many other languages, or if not, it's pretty close. For instance : Language - translation of eight - translation of…
user9165
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How do linguists find the etymology?

I was wondering, what is the method (or the methods) that linguists adopt to understand and know the etymology of a word? Are these methods reliable and in what measure? The knowledge I have on the matter is not that deep so I wanted to know exactly…
Alenanno
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Relations between 'knee' and 'generation'

Recently, a question was asked about the possibility of the words knee and generation being cognates. Unfortunately, that question is rather unclear, so I'm asking this as a separate post. The words in question are commonly derived from the PIE…
Marc Schütz
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Etymologically, why is there a v in "Giovanni"

It comes ultimately from Hebrew "Yochannon", via Greek Ioannes, from which German "Johannes" and Spanish "Juan" are very clear natural derivatives of that, given Greek had an h which was later lost (though the German borrowing must have come before…
Harry Anderson
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Is there a formal classification of types of word origins?

I'm trying to compile a list of possible types of word origins as a preliminary work before trying to design a database of etymological relations between words (mainly for Turkish but the ultimate goal is broader). By types of word origins, I mean…
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Practical ways to verify etymology

What online resources are available to trace back the origins of words? Ideally, this would be a searchable web dictionary like Wiktionary but listing the etymological chain along with some sort of proof (or a weaker reason to believe) - links to…
ngn
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Are "arithmetic" and "rhythm" related?

The online etymology dictionary says that arithmetic comes from Greek arithmos, from PIE *re(i)- "to reason, count" and gives as cognates English "read", Old High German "rim" "number", Old Irish rim "number," and Latin ritus "religious…
Anixx
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Words that only differ in tones

In indoeuropean languages the words that sound similar often denote related concepts. Is the situation similar in tonal languages? Are there languages that use a different tone to make an adjective out of a noun, for example?
vasily
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How did /hw/ become spelled ?

Why Do Languages Change? (2010) by R. L. Trask. p. 13.     Changes in pronunciation can happen with considerable speed. Consider /hw/. Historically, English had a number of words beginning with the sequence of consonants /hw/, curiously…
user5306
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Why aren't linguists formally trained in etymology?

McWhorter, J. PhD Linguistics (Stanford). Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue (2009). p. x Bottom.   Yet my impatience with the word fetish of typical popular treatments of The History of English is based in the fact that I happen to be a linguist.…
user5306
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Why does German word "deuten" mean "to interpret"?

deuten From Middle High German diuten, from Old High German diuten, from Proto-Germanic *þiudijanan. Cognate with Dutch duiden, Icelandic þýða (“translate”), Swedish tyda, Danish tyde. Related to Deutsch. Deutsch the German word for "German;"…
archenoo
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Macaroons, macarons, macaroni and...barley?

I really can't figure out the etymology of these 3 'mac-' words. According to google, the etymology for "macaroni" originates from late 17th century: from Italian maccaroni (now usually spelled maccheroni ), plural of maccarone, from late Greek…
theforestecologist
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