Greetings fellow Earthlings and anyone else who might be reading this. Did you know that this word originally meant farmer?
These days in Science Fiction, an Earthling is “an inhabitant of Earth, as opposed to one of another planet; specifically, a sentient member of any species native to Earth.”
In the 17th century is referred to “A person who is materialistic or worldly; a worldling.” and in the 16th century, it referred to “An inhabitant of Earth, as opposed to one of heaven.” [source]
Going back further, it meant one who tills the earth, a farmer, a husbandman or a ploughman. It comes from Middle English erthling (farmer, ploughman), from Old English ierþling, eorþling (farmer, husbandman, ploughman), from eorþe (ground, dirt, planet Earth), from PIE *h₁er- (earth) [source]
Other interesting words suffixed with -ling include:
puffling = a young puffin
princeling = a minor or unimportant prince
sportling = a little person or creature engaged in sports or in play
shaveling = someone with all or part of their head shaved, notably a tonsured clergyman; a priest or monk (often derogatory).
wildling = a wild plant or animal
witling = a person who feigns wit, pretending or aspiring to be witty, a person with very little wit.
godling = a young god, a minor divinity, a local or inferior god, a.k.a. godlet, godkin
There’s also underling (a subordinate or person of lesser rank or authority), and it’s rare antonym overling (a superior, ruler, master) [source]
Foods, and the words that describe them, can travel around the world. For example, tea comes from China, and so do words for tea in many languages. Similarly, avocado, chocolate, tamale, tomato come from Mexico (both the words and the foods).
Those words came to Europe from other continents, and I recently discovered some words that travelled from Europe, or Western Asia, to many other parts of the world.
It started with the Proto-Indo-European word *médʰu (honey, mead), which spread throughout Europe and Asia, and possibly as far as China, Korea, Japan and Vietnam [source].
Descendants of *médʰu include:
մեղու [meʁú] = bee in Armenian
мед (med) = honey in Bulgarian
mõdu [mjøːd] = mead in Estonian
Met [meːt] = mead in German
μέθη (méthi) = drunkenness in Greek
מותק (mótek) = sweetness in Hebrew
मॊदुर / مۆدُر (modur) = sweet, tasty, delicious in Kashmiri
medus [mædus] = honey, mead in Latvian
މީރު [miː.ɾu] = pleasant, sweet, agreeable, savoury in Maldivian
medveď [ˈmɛdvɛc] = bear (“honey-eater”) in Slovak
mjöd [mjøːd] = mead in Swedish
மதுரம் [mɐd̪ʊɾɐm] = sweetness in Tamil
medd [meːð] = mead, and meddw [ˈmɛðu] = drunk in Welsh
The Irish name Méabh (Maeve) also comes from the same roots, via Middle Irish medb (intoxicating) [source]. For more details of related words in Celtic languages, see this Celtiadur post: Honey Wine
It also reached China, where it became mīt (honey) in Tocharian B, and was possibly borrowed into Old Chinese as *mit (honey), which became 蜜 (mì – honey) in Mandarin, 蜜 (mat6 [mɐt˨] – bee, honeybee) in Cantonese, 蜜 (mitsu – honey, nectar, moasses, syrup) in Japanese, 밀 (mil – beeswax) in Korean, and mật (honey, molasses) and mứt (jam) in Vietnamese [source].
Someone who is supercilious is arrogantly superior, haughty or shows contemptuous indifference.
Supercilious comes from the Latin superciliōsus (haughty, supercilious) from supercilium (eyebrow, will, pride, haughtiness, arrogance, sterness, superciliousness) from super- (above, over) and cilium ( eyelid), from Proto-Italic *keljom, from PIE *ḱel-yo-m, from *ḱel- (to cover) [source].
Equivalents of supercilious in other languages include:
hooghartig (“high-hearted”) = haughty, supercilious in Dutch
hochnäsig (“high-nosed”) = snooty, stuck-up, haughty, supercilious, arrogant in German
kione-ard (“high-head”) = arrogant, chieftain, haughty, presumptuous, supercilious in Manx
ffroenuchel (“high-nostril”) = haughty, disdainful, supercilious in Welsh
The word cilium also exists in English, and means:
A short microscopic hairlike organelle projecting from a eukaryotic cell, which serve either for propulsion by causing currents in the surrounding fluid or as sensors.
One of the fine hairs along an insect’s wing.
Hairs or similar protrusions along the margin of an organ.
Related words in other languages include: cil (eyelash), and sourcil (eyebrow) in French, ceja (eyebrow, rim, edge) in Spanish, and ciglio (eyelash, eyebrow, border, edge, side) in Italian [source].
Other (eye)brow-related words include:
highbrow = intellectually stimulating, highly cultured, sophisticated; a cultured or learned person or thing
middlebrow = neither highbrow or lowbrow, but somewhere in between; a person or thing that is neither highbrow nor lowbrow, but in between
lowbrow = unsophisticated, not intended for an audience of intelligence, education or culture; someone or something of low education or culture.
Highbrow first appeared in print in 1875, and originally referred to the ‘science’ of phrenology, which suggested that a person of intelligence and sophistication would possess a higher brow-line than someone of lesser intelligence and sophistication [source]. Lowbrow was also conntected to phrenology and first appeared in about 1902 [source]. Middlebrow first appeared in Punch magazine in 1925 and is based highbrow and lowbrow [source].
If something is completely devoid of cultural or educational value, it could be said to be no-brow / nobrow, a word popularized by John Seabrook in his book Nobrow: the culture of marketing, the marketing of culture (2000) [source].
Incidentally, raising or furrowing your eyebrows is used to show you are asking a question in British Sign Language (BSL). Do other sign languages do this?
Do you know of any other interesting brow-related expressions?
Alliteration is “The repetition of consonant sounds at the beginning of two or more words immediately succeeding each other, or at short intervals.” [source]. As in the sentence above. It comes from Modern/New Latin alliterationem, from alliterare (to begin with the same letter), from Latin ad (to, near) and lītera (letter, script) [source].
Other names for this include consonance (the repetition of consonants sounds) [source] and head rhyme. If similar or indentical vowel sounds are being repeated, as in “How now, brown cow?”, it’s called assonance [source] or slant rhyme.
Other kinds of rhymes include:
syllabic rhyme: the last syllable of each word sounds the same but does not necessarily contain stressed vowels. E.g. cleaver, silver; pitter, patter.
imperfect (or near) rhyme: a rhyme between a stressed and an unstressed syllable. E.g. wing, caring
weak (or unaccented) rhyme: a rhyme between two sets of one or more unstressed syllables. E.g. hammer, carpenter
semirhyme: a rhyme with an extra syllable on one word. E.g. bend, ending
forced (or oblique) rhyme: a rhyme with an imperfect match in sound. E.g. green and fiend; one, thumb)
pararhyme: all consonants match. E.g. tick, tock; bing, bong
Other types of rhyme, and other ways of classifying rhymes are available [More details].
I use a variety of rhymes in the songs I write. For example, my latest song was inspired by a phrase from the Irish course in Duolingo “Léann na lachan na nuachtán.” (The ducks read the newspaper). I made a more alliterative version: “Tá lacha ag léamh leabhar sa leabhrlann le leon agus luch.” (A duck is reading a book in the library with a lion and a mouse). The English version is only slightly alliterative, and that’s what often happens with translations, and why songs and poems are difficult to translate.
Here are the words of the song. Parts are quite alliterative, in Irish at least.
Eachtraí na Lacha (The Duck’s Adventures)
Tá an lacha ag léamh sa leabharlann
The duck is reading in the library
Tá an lacha ag léamh sa leabharlann
le leon agus luch (with a lion and a mouse)
Tá an lacha ag siúl go Sligeach
The duck is walking to Sligo
Tá an lacha ag siúl go Sligeach
ag lorg lámhainní (looking for gloves)
Tá an lacha ag canadh amhrán
The duck is singing a song
Tá an lacha ag canadh amhrán
faoi sionach an-sionnachúil (about a very cunning fox)
Tá an lacha ag labhairt Laidin
The duck is speaking Latin
Tá an lacha ag labhairt Laidin
lena lucht leanúna (with its supporters)
Tá an lacha ina coladh ina leabaidh
The duck is sleeping in its bed
Tá an lacha ina coladh ina leabaidh
Agus sin deireadh an scéil
And that’s the end of the tale
Agus sin deireadh an scéil
Here’s a rough recording:
I’ve been thinking of making it trilingual in Irish, English and Welsh, but haven’t got round to it yet.
Here’s an alliterative phrase I came up with that seems to translate well into a variety of languages:
English: Singers sing songs
Albanian: Këngëtarët këndojnë këngë
Armenian: Երգիչները երգեր են երգում (Yergich’nery yerger yen yergum)
Aymara: Q’uchunakax q’uchunak q’uchupxi
Bengali: গায়কেরা গান গায় (Gāẏakērā gāna gāẏa)
Bulgarian: Певците пеят песни (Pevtsite peyat pesni)
Have you a swashed any buckles or buckled any swashes recently? Do you known the differences between a pirate, a privateer and a buccaneer? What about a freebooter or a corsair?
A swashbuckler is a swordsman or fencer who engages in showy or extravagant swordplay, a daring adventurer or a kind of period adventure story with flashy action and a lighthearted tone [source].
A swashbuckler likes to swashbuckle, that is, take part in exciting romantic adventures [source].
Swash as a noun has a variety of meanings, including:
The water that washes up on shore after an incoming wave has broken.
A narrow sound or channel of water lying within a sand bank, or between a sand bank and the shore, or a bar over which the sea washes.
A wet splashing sound.
A smooth stroke; a swish.
A swishing noise.
A long, protruding ornamental line or pen stroke found in some typefaces and styles of calligraphy.
A streak or patch.
As a verb, to swash means:
To swagger; to act with boldness or bluster (toward).
Swash also appears in swash letter (an italic capital letter with top and bottom flourishes, intended to fill an unsightly gap.) [source]; and swish-swash (a repeated swishing action or sound, going back and forth) [source].
A buckler is “a kind of shield, of various shapes and sizes, held in the hand or worn on the arm (usually the left), for protecting the front of the body. In the Middle Ages in England, the buckler was a small shield, used not to cover the body but to stop or parry blows.” [source].
A pirate is “a criminal who plunders at sea; commonly attacking merchant vessels, though often pillaging port towns.” It comes from Old French pirate (pirate), from Latin pīrāta (pirate), from Ancient Greek πειρατής (peiratḗs – brigand, robber), from πεῖρα (peîra – trial, attempt, plot). It replaced the Old English word wīċing, which could refer to a pirate or a viking [source], although vikings were more commonly called Norþmenn (north people), hǣþene (pagans) or Dene (Danes) [source].
A privateer was historically a privately owned warship that acted under a letter of marque to attack enemy merchant ships and take possession of their cargo. An officer or any other member of the crew of such a ship, or in other words, a government-sanctioned pirate [source].
Buccaneer is another word for pirate, and specifically refers to pirates who preyed on the ships of other nations on the Spanish Main and in the Pacific in the 17th century. It comes from French boucanier (buccaneer), from boucaner (to smoke or broil meat and fish, to hunt wild beasts for their skins), from boucan ([Tupi-style] grill), from Old Tupi m(b)oka’ẽ (wooden grill) [source].
A freebooter refers to an adventurer who pillages, plunders or wages ad-hoc war on other nations. It comes from Dutch vrijbuiter (freebooter, pirate), from vrijbuit (plunder, spoils) [source]. The old word flibustier (a French pirate in the Americas) comes from the same roots [source], as does filibuster [source].
Incidentally, the Dutch word buit (spoil, booty, loot, prey, gains), and the English word booty, might ultimately come from the Proto-Celtic word *boudi (victory, booty, spoils), as does the name Boudica [source].
A corsair refers specifically to French privateers, especially from the port of Saint-Malo, and the ships they sail. It can also refer to privateers and pirates in general.
It comes from French corsaire (privateer, corsair, pirate), from Italian corsaro (privateer, corsair, pirate), from Medieval Latin cursārius (pirate, sea-raider), from Latin cursus (course, running, race, way, passage, journey, voyage) [source].
Are there any other words for pirate that I’ve missed?
For more seafaring-related words, see this podcast, which inspired this post:
What’s the connection between chocolate and peanuts?
Well, peanuts covered with chocolate taste good, and they are both native to the Americas, but apart from that, a French word for peanut, cacahuète [ka.ka.ɥɛt / ka.ka.wɛt], was borrowed from Spanish cacahuate / cacahuete [ka.kaˈwa.t̪e / kakaˈwete] (peanut), which comes from the Classical Nahuatl cacahuatl (cocoa bean), from Proto-Nahuan *kakawatl, from Proto-Mixe-Zoque *kakawa (cacao) [source]. This is also the root of words for cacao, the main ingredient in chocolate (at least good chocolate), in many languages [source].
In Spanish, cacahuate is used in Honduras and Mexico, while cacahuete is used in Spain and El Salvador. Another word for peanut in Spanish is maní, which is used in most other Spanish-speaking countries. It was borrowed from Taíno [source].
The origins of the word chocolate are not entirely clear. The English word was borrowed from the Spanish chocolate, and it’s thought that the Spanish word came from Classical Nahuatl. Possibly from *xocolātl (to make sour) and ātl (water), or from a combination of the Yucatec Maya word chocol (hot) and the Classical Nahuatl ātl (water) [source].
Other English words that come from Classical Nahuatl include avocado, chia, chili, guacamole, haricot and tomato, as well as names such as Aztec, Guatemala and Mexico [source].
Incidentally, in the southern USA peanuts are/were known as goobers, and this word used to refer to people from Georgia and North Carolina, and to foolish, simple or amusingly silly people. Goober comes from Gullah, from the Kongo word ngubá (peanut) [source].
The words rifle and ruffle sound similar, but are they related? Let’s find out.
A rifle is a firearm fired from the shoulder with a long, rifled barrel, which increases range and improves accuracy. It is short for “rifled gun”, referring to the spiral grooves inside the barrel (rifling).
It comes from Middle English riflen (to rob, plunder, search through), from Old French rifler (to lightly scratch, scrape off, plunder), from Proto-Germanic *rīfaną (to tear, rend), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁reyp- (to tear) [source].
A ruffle is any gathered or curled strip of fabric added as trim or decoration; or a disturbance, agitation or commotion.
It comes from Middle English ruffelen, perhaps from Old Norse hrufla (to graze, scratch), or Middle Low German ruffelen (to wrinkle, curl). Beyond that, the etymology is not certain [source].
So it seems that rifle and ruffle are not related.
Words that do come from the same roots as rifle include rift, rip and rope in English; rive (bank [of a river]) in French, and arriba (above, over, up) in Spanish [source].
Words that do come from the same roots as ruffle include ruff in English, and hrufla (to graze, scratch) in Icelandic [source].
The English word riffle (a swift, shallow part of a stream causing broken water; a succession of small waves; a quick skim through the pages of a book; to ruffle with a rippling action, etc) is possibly an alteration of ruffle [source].
I used to be, but now I’m more of a dormilón and a trasnochador.
Madrugador [ma.ð̞ɾu.ɣ̞aˈð̞oɾ] is a Spanish (and Portuguese) word that means an early riser, early bird or morning person, and as an adjective it means rising or waking early. [source].
Madrugador comes from madrugar (to get up early), from Vulgar Latin *mātūricāre (to wake up early), from Latin matūro (to ripen, mature, hasten, rush), from mātūrus (mature, ripe, early, soon), from Proto-Italic *mātus (ripeness) from the PIE *meh₂- (to ripen, to mature) [source].
Sometimes you can pack a lot of meaning into one word in Spanish, for example, madrugaba (I/he/she/it used to get up early) and madrugadores madrugaban (early risers used to rise early).
Related words include madrugada (dawn, early hours of the morning, before dawn) and madrugón (early riser, early bird, early start).
Words with similar meanings include tempranero (early, early-rising, early riser) [source] and mañanero (early rising, morning, early riser) [source].
How would you say early riser in other languages?
By the way, there’s a novel by Jasper Fforde called Early Riser that I would recommend.
If you’re a late riser, like me, then you’re a dormilón, which should not be confused with dormilona (reclining chair, nightgown), and if you stay up late, you could be described as a trasnochador (night owl, night bird) or a noctámbulo (active at night, sleepwalker, night owl) [source].
Are there interesting equivalents of late riser or night owl in other languages?
The English words mature and maturate (to ripen, bring to ripeness or maturity) come from the same Latin roots [source].
Apparently a quien madruga, Dios le ayuda (“God helps those who rise early”) or in other words the early bird gets the worm [source].
How would you say that in other languages?
Alternatively, you could say no por mucho madrugar, amanece más temprano (“getting up earlier won’t make the sun rise sooner”) or in other words things will happen at their own time, you can’t rush art [source].
The verb to nurdle can mean to gently waffle or muse on a subject which one clearly knows little about, which is something I do occasionally, or to score runs (in cricket) by gently nudging the ball into vacant areas of the field. It can also mean to shoot (a wink) into a position too close to the pot to be easily potted (in tiddlywinks).
As a noun, a nurdle is such a shot in cricket or tiddlywinks; cylindrical shaped pre-production plastic pellet used in manufacturing and packaging; or blob of toothpaste shaped like a wave, often depicted on toothpaste packaging [source].
The toothpaste nurdle, was apparently coined by the American Dental Association to educate the public about proper tooth brushing. It first appeared, as nerdle, in an article in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch in August 1996. The spelling later changed to nurdle. It is possible related to nodule, which comes from Latin nōdulus (small knot), from nōdus (knot) [source].
The 1958/59 ITV sketch show After Hours featured the olde English sport of drats, later known as nurdling. This might be one origin of the word [source].
Nurdling can also refer to the practise of collecting little plastic nurdles wash up on beaches [source].
Nurdle should not be confused with noodle, which as a verb means:
To play (a musical instrument or passage of music) or to sing (a passage of music) in an improvisatory or lighthearted manner.
To ponder or think about (something)
To play a musical instrument or to sing in an improvisatory or lighthearted manner; also, to play a series of ornamental notes on an instrument.
To ponder or think, especially in an unproductive or unsystematic manner; to muse.
To attempt in an informal or uncertain manner; to fiddle.
Other meanings are available. This possibly comes from the German word nudeln (o make music or sing listlessly; to make music or sing at a low pitch or volume, or in an improvisatory manner) [source].
Let’s finish with some wise words from the great Rambling Syd Rumpo a singer of silly folk songs played by Kenneth Williams on the BBC Radio comedy show Round The Horne:
Early one morning
Just as my splod was rising
I heard a maiden scream in the valley below
O don’t nurdle me
O never nurdle me
How could you use your cordwangle so!
When you ask someone to do something for you, but in an indirect kind of way, or in other words, you phrase an order or imperative obliquely as a question, this is apparently called a whimperative. For example, you might say “Would you mind closing the window?”, rather than the more direct “Please, close the window” or “Close the window!”. Or you might say “Why don’t you be quiet?” instead of “Be quiet” [source].
This word was coined by Jerrold Sadock, a professor of Linguistics at the University of Chicago, in an essay he wrote in 1970. It’s a blend of whimper and imperative. Another term for a whimperative is interrogative directive [source].
A whimper is a low intermittent sob, and to whimper means to cry or sob softly and intermittently, to cry with a low, whining, broken voice, to whine, to complain, or to say something in a whimpering manner [source].
It is probably of imitative origin, or may by related to wimmern (to whimper, moan) in German. The words wimp and wimpy possibly come from whimper, and were likely influenced by the charcter J. Wellington Wimpy in the Popeye comics [source].
The word imperative (essential, crucial, expressing a command) comes from the Latin word imperātīvus (of or proceeding from a command, commanded), from imperō (to comand, give orders to, demand, rule, govern), from in- (in) and parō (to arrange, order, resolve) [source].
Words from the same roots include pare (to cut away the outer layer from something, especially a fruit or a vegetable) in English, parer (to adorn, bedeck, fend off) in French, parer (to stop, halt, put up, lift, stand up) in Spanish and paratoi (to prepare) in Welsh [source].
