The Interesting Etymology Behind 70 Words

Etymology is not an exact science, but the stories behind word origins and etymologies can still teach us a lot about linguistics. In this episode of The List Show, Erin breaks down the interesting etymology of 70 words, from vaccine to science.

You'll learn the etymology of vaccine and much more.

[callmeworms]

These kinds of videos always make me think of people in the future doing this with our words today

[therealEmpyre]

You missed an opportunity to tell the fascinating story of the word pink. It originally meant small. That's why your smallest finger is called a pinky. If your eye is swollen shut, therefore small, you have pinkeye. There are flowers that resemble such an eye, so they were named pinkeyes. I think you can guess what color those flowers are. The color is named after those flowers.

[littlepixy]

My kind of video!! I'm always looking up etymology for the most mundane words haha. Language evolution is so cool!

[Kictor]

8:45 everything they own in the box to the left LOL that was so good

[VideoNozoki]

8:51 "A promising premium cable show that totally jumped the shark,
but then got a reboot anyway." - Best definition of Dexter that I ever heard so far. ☆☆☆
(Kudos.)

[leemiller]

My favorite etymology is cantaloupe.

The variety of musk melon is came from the Papal estate Cantalupo di Sabina in the Sabine Hills. The estate got the name from the canta lupo (song of the wolf) from the wolves howling you could hear echoing through the hills.

[spyone]

An elementary school special education teacher tasked with tutoring me in penmanship commented to my parents that I wasn't so much ambidextrous as ambisintral - not particularly good with either hand. (It was many years before they shared that with me.)
Goodness, that's an apt description.

[avalondaedalus]

Fascinating stuff. As an Albanian speaker, amongst a few slavic and romance languages, I found many parallel meanings here found in Albanian, mostly through a latin common origin . In Albanian "Kap" (pronounced the same as "Cop"), means to grab or to catch! Whiskey's meaining in Gaelic as "littlle water" has the same root in Albanian "Uj" (pronounced "oo-ee").
"Krymb" means is a worm in Albanian too. etc, etc...

[JDCheng]

24:10 Friday deriving from Frigga ("Frija's day") missed mentioning her husband Odin getting a day ("Wodin's day" becoming Wednesday), and Odin's son Thor the day following ("Thor's day").

[wisadenplough]

Canary derives its name from Tamazight, also known as Berber, the language of the indigenous people of North Africa. The Guanch, who are also Amazigh( Berbers), are the native inhabitants of the Canary Islands. Canary is a variation of the Amazigh word Aknary, which means prickly pear. If you’ve ever been to the Islands, there are prickly pears everywhere, hence the name.

[FirmaF]

So excited to hear Latin pronounced correctly. Thanks for all your great work!

[ChateauShack]

I have one! *POUTINE* is a French Canadian word that comes from the English word 'pudding'. There still is no word for pudding today in the French language - if you order a chocolate pudding in a restaurant you call it 'une pudding au chocolat". When the French Canadians saw how English Christmas pudding was made and having no comparable recipe, anything with a load of ingredients was to them a 'poutine", as they understood the word. In some regions, people still call a mishmash of leftovers or some not too palatable mix "de la poutine pour les chats" (cat pudding). So, one day, someone with a serious hangover or with not much left in the pantry, combined curd cheese, fries and gravy to the world's delight and to the arteries dismay.
As a teenager, I was surprised to see on restaurant menus in many regions outside of the city, fries offered with gravy and some even with peas. My guess is that a lot of people enjoyed their fries dripping in sauce from a hot chicken sandwich. Then someone added curd cheese and the rest is history.

[jamesmitchell]

Do one of these for music!!! Piano, guitar, trombone, accompaniment, da capo, fermata, sforzando, sharps & flats!

[tedturner]

You!!! Are witty. Are bright. Have a lovely tone to your voice. And are both credible and entertaining. Bravo.

Cadence - maybe slow down a tad. A little speedy. More conversational? Less prompter? Love the topic.

[egesuo]

In Turkish we say şah mat instead of check mate. Which makes more sense now

[hhairball]

That was wonderful and informative! Thank you!

[samuelesanfilippo]

one that i like a lot is Crown, taking root in the PIE term "be curved", which then refere to the animal Crow, same reason why the term crowbar exist

[freedapeeple]

It's probably out of print now but if you can find a book called "Words Of Science" by Isaac Asimov I recommend grabbing it.

[joecat]

Great video Erin love this sort of show
Just one point though “Nimrod” and the “Tower of Babel” are both mentioned in Genesis, chapters 10 and 11 respectively

[Liggliluff]

(2:25) I find it interesting how "capere" becomes "caperay", but "capia" didn't become "capiey". English speakers adding random diphthongs to words without diphthongs is weird but interesting.