Tag: etymology
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Background checks: everyday words with legal origins
I have a new post up on the OxfordWords blog, “Background checks: everyday words with legal origins.” From nude to innuendo, a great number of common words have a surprisingly legal record. Here’s my bit on mayhem: Dating back to the 15th century, mayhem historically denoted a criminal offense. As the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) defines it, mayhem was ‘the infliction of physical injury on a person, so…
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jumbo
Last week, the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus announced that it is finally retiring its elephant act. Perhaps the circus’s most famous elephant was Jumbo, whom Barnum bought from the London Zoo in 1882 with much hullabaloo. Jumbo’s legendary size lives on in the legacy of his name. Jumbo cigars fill our mouths and…
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akimbo
When I posted my latest piece on jar, writer Jag Bhalla, who goes by @hangingnoodles on Twitter, noted: #etymology of "jar"…Arabic to poetry jam http://t.co/3dumA8ezX7 @mashedradish @andrescalo It's Pandora's jar not boxhttp://t.co/EG9pcTzPcH — Jag Bhalla…Idea Trader/Thought Plumber (@hangingnoodles) February 27, 2015 Indeed, Pandora’s “box” was, as the Ancient Greek records, actually a pithos, a kind of jar.…
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swear jars & springtime
Perhaps you are observing Lent. Perhaps your observance involves a sacrifice. Perhaps that sacrifice is giving up swearing. Maybe you are enforcing that sacrifice with a swear jar. And maybe you contributed quite the funds to your swear jar after viewing last Sunday’s Academy Awards. If so, you definitely don’t want to miss my latest post on Strong Language,…
Mashed Radish 