Etymology and surprising origins of English words

Learn about etymology, the study of word origins and derivations in historical linguistics, and the influence of a Proto-Indoeuropean (PIE) language in the formation of English and other modern languages in Europe, Russia, and Asia. Highlighted is how etymologists have come up with a theoretical model of the Proto-Indoeuropean language; how Modern English was influenced by the Proto-Germanic and Latin languages, both descendants of PIE; and how English continues to borrow words from other languages.

TO CLARIFY THE ORIGIN OF "WAR"
PIE *wers- "to confuse, mix up" ► Frankish *werra ► Old North French "werre (Old French "guerre," meaning dispute, war) ► late Old English wyrre, werre "large-scale military conflict." Cognates suggest the original sense was "to bring into confusion." There's much confusion in the history of the word in European languages because they borrowed it either from the Germanic or from the Latin root. Etymological trees can have many twisted and intersecting branches (which makes me glad I'm not an etymologist:)

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RELATED LINKS
Scientific American (2018). New Evidence Fuels Debate over the Origin of Modern Languages (web article):

*Note: There are disagreements regarding where PIE originated and exactly how it spread.

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#language #linguistics #etymology

[msc.fahmdyar]

I am from Afghanistan and speak 7 languages, farsi, pashto danish english german urdu and arabic, I see a lot of similarities between languages. Etymology is very interesting and can bring us closer, we are all one people.

[Ralphieboy]

"People who don't know the difference between entomology and etymology bug me in ways I cannot put into words."

[Thanos_Kyriakopoulos]

The etymology of the word etymology is etymon: truth and logos: reason, speech, word. So it's the truth of words

[radiozelaza]

There's even a word in English which came all the way directly from Polish - spruce. This freaky tree was imported from the East Baltic region (known back then as Prussia), brought by Polish-speaking merchants who when asked "where's it from?" answered in Polish - "z Prus" (from Prussia). It sounded like SPRUCE.

[vicmarmo]

I love anyone who loves his stuff, knows his stuff, and shares that passion with others 🥰

[christianfreedom-seeker]

"Are you worth your salt?" The ancient question posed to members of the merchant class. So really what is being asked is "Are you worth your salary?"

[zubairon]

I'm a Bengali and I teach children English.
It fascinates me that even though Bangla is technically the easternmost language by origin in the Proto Indo-European family while English is one of the westernmost, their grammar more often than not mirror each other. I know a good amount of Hindi-Urdu & a fair bit of German. And, I can assure you that in some ways German has features more in common with Hindi-Urdu than with English. And, even though Hindi-Urdu has a huge lexical similarity with Bangla, it's easier for a Bengali child to understand English and Bangla grammar side-by-side.

[monicacall]

I was so delighted and extremely excited to find your channel! My fourth grade teacher made learning etymology at a basic level (root words, suffixes, prefixes, origin of the words, original meaning, etc.) so fascinating that I began to read the dictionary out of curiosity and, frankly, just for fun. I still do. This love of words has continued over the years and has flowed over into my study of Romance languages (French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese) too. I’m ready to learn more about one of my favorite subjects. Thanks for making this wonderful resource available to all of us who love words! I feel like I just hit the jackpot and discovered a treasure trove of new information.

[athrongthongru]

Why are there so little likes. This channel deserves million likes.
Keep it up!!!

[portlandart]

Salt was physical money in ancient Roman. Roman soldiers were paid partly in salt. Hence 'salary'.

[johnnevin]

Really interesting video!
That g -> w shift happened a lot between English and French. For example, garderobe gave English wardrobe, This is similar to the k -> h shift you mention: the two sounds used to be closer. Sometimes both survive, as in guarantee and warranty.

[Effrosyne]

The word etymology derives from the Greek word ετυμολογία  (etumología), itself from ἔτυμον (étumon), meaning "true sense or sense of a truth", and the suffix -logia, denoting "the study of".
Thank you for this video ❤️

[jefftonkinson]

This is one of the best examples of using text overlays to convey content and keep it interesting. Very well done.

[angelinasophiakamaratou]

As a Greek, I love the fact that we learn Ancient Greek at school too. I'm proud to say that the English language has borrowed 41 645 words from Greek!

[vayalobo]

I'd like to know why the number 8 and the word "night" sound so similar in various languages:
Spanish: ocho - noche
Portuguese: oito - noite
Italian: otto - notte
English: eight - night
German: Acht - Nacht
Rumanian: opt - noapte
Catalan: vuit - nit
etc.

[Oxaras]

I am a native Persian speaker but I also speak English and French when I learned French and English I saw so many similarities between English French and Persian oh, there is hundreds if not thousands of similar words in these languages that were borrowed and have the same route

[YorgosEU]

I'm a native Greek speaker learning Dutch. It's amazing how many similarities I see in verbs that are made out of a main verb and a preposition (example1) .
Υπό =onder =under
Θετω=stellen
And υποθέτω = onderstellen =suppose. Etc...

[PatrickJouannes]

Etymology : My son (French) used to pronounce DRAPEAU "flag" as CRAPAUD "toad". This simple example shows how a word can evolve in meaning and spelling even in modern time. It's important to say that the invention of written language had a very important impact on the evolution of the spoken language : it can slow it down or on the contrary it can speed it up !!!

[virvisquevir]

"Gay" used to mean "happy" and then in the 1960's, the word "gay" was appropriated by homosexuals to refer to homosexuals. My teenage son and his friends use "gay" to refer to anything effeminate, fastidious, unnecessarily fussy or complicated, like wearing a shawl or fine shoes or having overly styled hair. So in the new meaning, not every homosexual is gay and not everyone gay is homosexual.

[aayushiagarwal]

This video is interesting. I love this 🔥♥️