Wordorigins.org Newsletter

booty / booty call

Booty is actually two different words, one meaning plunder or loot and the other referring to sex. Booty, referring to plunder or loot, of is uncertain origin. It was borrowed from some European language, but there are any number of potential candidates. It’s cognate with the modern German Beute,

Shoddy Scholarship by Those Who Should Know Better

Last week the website Medievalists.net published a listicle titled, 12 Expressions that We Got from the Middle Ages. Unfortunately, only four of the twelve are actually medieval phrases, and two others, while modern formulations, come from metaphors that are rooted in medieval thought. The other six either predate the

berserk / berserker

Today, to be or to go berserk means to be frenzied or crazed, and the term carries a connotation of violence. The word comes from the Icelandic berserkr, meaning a powerful Norse warrior who displayed a wild and uncontrolled fury on the battlefield. In other words, a stereotypical Viking, or

Paid-members only

bootylicious / babelicious (paid)

Paid-members only

platinum (paid)

phosphorus

Phosphorus comes into English from classical Latin, where Phosphorus is a name for the planet Venus. The name comes ultimately from the Greek; the roots are φως- (phos-, light) + -φόρος (-phoros, bringer). So phosphorus is the light-bringer, and the element is named for its luminescent properties. (Lucifer also literally means

basket case

It is not uncommon for a grisly or shocking term to lose its impact over the years, to meliorate. Such is the situation with basket case. As the term is commonly used today, a basket case is someone who is under physical or, more usually, mental distress to the point

Paid-members only

booty / booty call (paid)

hard-nosed

To be hard-nosed is to be stubborn, unsentimental, uncompromising. The phrase is an Americanism, dating to the early twentieth century, but why hard-nosed? The answer comes from rifle ammunition. In the late nineteenth century, the introduction of cordite and nitrocellulose gunpowder, in addition to be being “smokeless,” created higher muzzle

Paid-members only

berserk / berserker (paid)

Paid-members only

phosphorus (paid)

palladium

Palladium is actually two words, with distinct, albeit related, etymological paths and meanings. The older use of the word comes from Greek myth, the newer one is the name of element 46. The original sense of palladium (often capitalized) was the name of a statue of the goddess Athena in

dollars to doughnuts

The phrase (I’ll bet) dollars to doughnuts is an Americanism dating to the late nineteenth century, referring to the stakes of an imagined wager on a sure thing. While due to inflation, today one would be hard pressed to find a doughnut for less than a dollar, when the

Paid-members only

basket case (paid)

Paid-members only

hard-nosed (paid)

meme stock

A meme stock is a publicly traded stock that experiences a sudden rise in value due to a concerted effort by a number of retail investors who organize over social media. The price of a meme stock usually has no relation to actual value of the company in question; they

Paid-members only

palladium (paid)

oxygen

Oxygen is a chemical element with atomic number eight and the symbol O. It is a highly reactive nonmetal that is a gas at room temperature. It’s the most abundant element in the earth’s crust and the third most abundant element in the universe, after hydrogen and helium.

Paid-members only

dollars to doughnuts (paid)

bee's knees

Most people associate the bee’s knees, meaning something that is excellent or otherwise superlative, with the Roaring ’20s and the Jazz Age. But while the phrase did come into its present-day meaning shortly before and experienced a rise in popularity during that era, it has precursor meanings that predate

Paid-members only

meme stock (paid)

creek / up shit's creek

I had no idea that British usage of creek was different from the use of the word in the rest of the English-speaking world until I was translating an Old Norse work (appropriately enough regarding the discovery and exploration of Vinland) and found that my Old Norse dictionary, produced in

Paid-members only

oxygen (paid)

zirconium / zircon / hyacinth

Zirconium is a chemical element with atomic number 40 and the symbol Zr. It is a lustrous, gray-white metal. The mineral zirconium silicate, also known as zircon, is common in the earth’s crust and has been known since antiquity. Zirconium has a variety of commercial uses, and zircon crystals

spaghettify / spaghettification

Astronomers are often rather creative with the names they come up with for the objects and processes they discover. An example is the verb to spaghettify and the noun spaghettification. The words describe what would happen to a person (or thing) who fell into a black hole. The gravity (tidal