Carnival of the Etymologies
[A regular Thursday feature of "Done with Mirrors"]
The space shuttle soars again. But the anxieties of the Columbia tragedy won't rest until Discovery comes down safely. Watching this astonishing machinery -- and the even more amazing men and women who pilot her -- reminds me of the audacity of human spaceflight, the sturdy frailty of it all, and of the lost Columbia.
The noun space appears in English around 1300; it originally had an earthbound meaning, "an area, extent, expanse, lapse of time." The astronomical sense of "stellar depths" first pops up in 1667, in "Paradise Lost." The word comes via French from Latin spatium "room, area, distance, stretch of time," a word of unknown origin.
Space age is attested from 1946. Many compounds and phrases featuring space first appeared in science fiction and speculative writing, e.g. spaceship (1894, "Journey in Other Worlds"); spacesuit (1920); spacecraft (1930, "Scientific American"); space travel (1931); space station (1936, "Rockets Through Space"); spaceman (1942, "Thrilling Wonder Stories;" in the 1890s it had meant "journalist paid by the length of his copy").
Shuttle as a name for a type of spacecraft that runs back and forth from Earth to space has been around since 1969; it was extended into space from a similar use in reference to aircraft (1942) and trains (1895). The image is of a weaver's instrument's back-and-forth movement over the warp.
The weaving instrument was so called (first attested 1338) from its being "shot" across the threads. The Old English word was scytel and it meant "a dart, an arrow." The word is related to shoot and to the Old Norse noun skutill "harpoon." Thus, unconsciously, the space shuttle returns the word to its roots, as it shoots through the clouds into the heavens.
In some other languages, the word for the weaver's machine takes its name from its resemblance to a boat (cf. Latin navicula, French navette, German weberschiff).
This shuttle is named Discovery. When it first appeared in English around 1300, however, the verb discover had a strong negative sense of "betray or maliciously expose." Discoverer originally meant "informant." The more benevolent modern meaning "to obtain knowledge or sight of what was not known" is first recorded in 1555.
The word comes from Old French descovrir, which is from a Late Latin compound of dis- "opposite of" and cooperire "to cover over."
The root of this Latin word is operire "to close, cover." This is itself a compound; the second element is from Proto-Indo-European *wer- "to cover, shut."
Among the other offspring of this ancient root-word are English weir (from Old English wer "dam, fence, enclosure," especially one for catching fish) and German Wehr "defense, protection," as in Wehrmacht, the old name of the German army. The close association of this name with the dynamic and aggressive military power of Nazi Germany belies its original sense of "defense force."
Outside Germanic, relatives include Sanskrit vatah "enclosure" and vrnoti "covers, wraps, shuts;" Lithuanian uzveriu "to shut, to close;" Old Persian *pari-varaka "protective;" Old Church Slavonic vora "sealed, closed" and vreti "shut;" and Old Irish feronn "field," properly "enclosed land."
Structurally, discovery is identical with apocalypse, which is the same compound, built of Greek elements (apo- "from" and kalyptein "to cover, conceal").
Anglo-Saxonists unhappy with discovery might choose unlidding as the native-born alternative. But it doesn't make a euphonious spacecraft name.
There's more talk of an exit strategy in Iraq. As far as I can tell, this phrase first began to be used in a military sense in 1993, in reference to the U.S. intervention in the Balkan war.
Exit is a straight-up Latin word, meaning "he or she goes out." To be grammatically technical, it's the third person singular present indicative of exire "go out," which is a compound of ex- "out" and ire "to go."
Strategy is a recent introduction in English, not attested before 1810. It comes ultimately from ancient Greek strategia "office or command of a general," a compound of strategos "general" (from stratos "multitude, army, expedition") and agos "leader."
The root meaning of stratos seems to have been "that which is spread out." The Greek word is from an ancient Proto-Indo-European root, *stere- "to spread, extend, stretch out." That makes it a relative of the strath in Scottish place names (meaning "wide river valley between hills"), sternum, prostrate, stratosphere, structure, straw (literally "that which is spread"), and street.
An army coup overthrew the ruler of Mauritania this week. Mauritania is a modern nation which took the name of an old Roman province in northwest Africa (a region now corresponding to northern Algeria and Morocco). The Romans named the province for the people who lived there, whom they called Maurus. The same Latin name came into English, via French, as Moor.
The Romans got the name from the Greeks (Mauros), and linguists debate whether this Greek word, which also meant "black," was a native name that the Greeks picked up and later used as an adjective, or a Greek word.
Being a dark people in relation to Europeans, the Moors saw their name used in the Middle Ages as a synonym for "Negro" and later (16c.-17c.) used indiscriminately to refer to Muslims (Persians, Arabs, etc.), especially those in India.
Coup in this sense is short for coup d'étate (1646), a French phrase meaning literally "stroke of the state." The Old French verb colp "to cut, the strike" comes from Latin colaphus "a cuff, box on the ear," which the Romans borrowed from Greek kolaphos "a blow, a slap."
If coup d'étate is too French for you, you could anglicize it as state-stroke (cf. sunstroke, a literal translation of French coup de soleil).
The kind of car called a coupe is the same word -- originally (1834) it was a type of "cut-off carriage," a shorter version of the berlin, minus the back seat. It comes from the past participle of French couper "to cut (in half)."
Coupon is another relative. Originally (1822) it meant "certificate of interest due on a bond," and it was so called because it could be cut from the bond and presented for payment. Also in the family are recoup, originally a legal term meaning "to deduct;" copse, originally "small wood grown for purposes of periodic cutting;" and the verb cope, the sense of which evolved in the 17th century from "come to blows with" to "handle successfully."
The space shuttle soars again. But the anxieties of the Columbia tragedy won't rest until Discovery comes down safely. Watching this astonishing machinery -- and the even more amazing men and women who pilot her -- reminds me of the audacity of human spaceflight, the sturdy frailty of it all, and of the lost Columbia.
She was a double-wide trailer fitted with angel wings. She could heft 4 million pounds into space and fly 17,000 mph and pass unscathed through a blast furnace that would pulverize a solid block of concrete and melt battlefield armor.
She cradled delicate scientific experiments, finicky computers and the most precious cargo imaginable, human lives.
Between the journeys through Hell, she would sit on the runways, sleek, strong, and proud. Sometimes, it seems, she knew what she meant to us as we watched her soar.
The noun space appears in English around 1300; it originally had an earthbound meaning, "an area, extent, expanse, lapse of time." The astronomical sense of "stellar depths" first pops up in 1667, in "Paradise Lost." The word comes via French from Latin spatium "room, area, distance, stretch of time," a word of unknown origin.
Space age is attested from 1946. Many compounds and phrases featuring space first appeared in science fiction and speculative writing, e.g. spaceship (1894, "Journey in Other Worlds"); spacesuit (1920); spacecraft (1930, "Scientific American"); space travel (1931); space station (1936, "Rockets Through Space"); spaceman (1942, "Thrilling Wonder Stories;" in the 1890s it had meant "journalist paid by the length of his copy").
Shuttle as a name for a type of spacecraft that runs back and forth from Earth to space has been around since 1969; it was extended into space from a similar use in reference to aircraft (1942) and trains (1895). The image is of a weaver's instrument's back-and-forth movement over the warp.
The weaving instrument was so called (first attested 1338) from its being "shot" across the threads. The Old English word was scytel and it meant "a dart, an arrow." The word is related to shoot and to the Old Norse noun skutill "harpoon." Thus, unconsciously, the space shuttle returns the word to its roots, as it shoots through the clouds into the heavens.
In some other languages, the word for the weaver's machine takes its name from its resemblance to a boat (cf. Latin navicula, French navette, German weberschiff).
This shuttle is named Discovery. When it first appeared in English around 1300, however, the verb discover had a strong negative sense of "betray or maliciously expose." Discoverer originally meant "informant." The more benevolent modern meaning "to obtain knowledge or sight of what was not known" is first recorded in 1555.
The word comes from Old French descovrir, which is from a Late Latin compound of dis- "opposite of" and cooperire "to cover over."
The root of this Latin word is operire "to close, cover." This is itself a compound; the second element is from Proto-Indo-European *wer- "to cover, shut."
Among the other offspring of this ancient root-word are English weir (from Old English wer "dam, fence, enclosure," especially one for catching fish) and German Wehr "defense, protection," as in Wehrmacht, the old name of the German army. The close association of this name with the dynamic and aggressive military power of Nazi Germany belies its original sense of "defense force."
Outside Germanic, relatives include Sanskrit vatah "enclosure" and vrnoti "covers, wraps, shuts;" Lithuanian uzveriu "to shut, to close;" Old Persian *pari-varaka "protective;" Old Church Slavonic vora "sealed, closed" and vreti "shut;" and Old Irish feronn "field," properly "enclosed land."
Structurally, discovery is identical with apocalypse, which is the same compound, built of Greek elements (apo- "from" and kalyptein "to cover, conceal").
Anglo-Saxonists unhappy with discovery might choose unlidding as the native-born alternative. But it doesn't make a euphonious spacecraft name.
There's more talk of an exit strategy in Iraq. As far as I can tell, this phrase first began to be used in a military sense in 1993, in reference to the U.S. intervention in the Balkan war.
Exit is a straight-up Latin word, meaning "he or she goes out." To be grammatically technical, it's the third person singular present indicative of exire "go out," which is a compound of ex- "out" and ire "to go."
Strategy is a recent introduction in English, not attested before 1810. It comes ultimately from ancient Greek strategia "office or command of a general," a compound of strategos "general" (from stratos "multitude, army, expedition") and agos "leader."
The root meaning of stratos seems to have been "that which is spread out." The Greek word is from an ancient Proto-Indo-European root, *stere- "to spread, extend, stretch out." That makes it a relative of the strath in Scottish place names (meaning "wide river valley between hills"), sternum, prostrate, stratosphere, structure, straw (literally "that which is spread"), and street.
An army coup overthrew the ruler of Mauritania this week. Mauritania is a modern nation which took the name of an old Roman province in northwest Africa (a region now corresponding to northern Algeria and Morocco). The Romans named the province for the people who lived there, whom they called Maurus. The same Latin name came into English, via French, as Moor.
The Romans got the name from the Greeks (Mauros), and linguists debate whether this Greek word, which also meant "black," was a native name that the Greeks picked up and later used as an adjective, or a Greek word.
Being a dark people in relation to Europeans, the Moors saw their name used in the Middle Ages as a synonym for "Negro" and later (16c.-17c.) used indiscriminately to refer to Muslims (Persians, Arabs, etc.), especially those in India.
Coup in this sense is short for coup d'étate (1646), a French phrase meaning literally "stroke of the state." The Old French verb colp "to cut, the strike" comes from Latin colaphus "a cuff, box on the ear," which the Romans borrowed from Greek kolaphos "a blow, a slap."
If coup d'étate is too French for you, you could anglicize it as state-stroke (cf. sunstroke, a literal translation of French coup de soleil).
The kind of car called a coupe is the same word -- originally (1834) it was a type of "cut-off carriage," a shorter version of the berlin, minus the back seat. It comes from the past participle of French couper "to cut (in half)."
Coupon is another relative. Originally (1822) it meant "certificate of interest due on a bond," and it was so called because it could be cut from the bond and presented for payment. Also in the family are recoup, originally a legal term meaning "to deduct;" copse, originally "small wood grown for purposes of periodic cutting;" and the verb cope, the sense of which evolved in the 17th century from "come to blows with" to "handle successfully."
Labels: etymology
