A word of unknown origin

Published March 24, 2020

Words of unknown origins …

Every word has a story to tell. Take the word companion. Did you know it comes from a Latin word that has the literal sense of “one who breaks bread with another?” Or consider the word silly. Its original sense was “blessed.” Then there are words like transfer or provide, whose roots appear all over English vocabulary, from odoriferous to clairvoyance.

But then there are words whose origins are just utterly obscure. These are often everyday words—those humble syllables we use all the time but which we don’t always stop to consider. Like dog, which is where we begin this slideshow dedicated to words of mysterious etymology.

WATCH: What Is The Origin Of The Word «Bamboozle»?

dog

Man’s most lovable and loyal friend is actually one of English’s most perplexing mysteries.

The word dog comes from the rare Old English word docga. The more usual word back then was hund, which became hound. Fun fact: the Latin word for dog, canis, is the source of the word canine and it etymologically related to hound.

But where did this word dog come from? Theories have been offered, but etymologists are left scratching their heads.

The Spanish word for dog, perro, is also of obscure origin.

rabbit

There’s just something about the names of some of the most familiar animals …

The word rabbit is also ultimately obscure. But, compared to dog, we are few hops closer to a source with rabbit.

Found in Middle English, rabbit originally meant “young rabbit, bunny,” and was probably borrowed from a French word. Etymologists point us to the Walloon robett and the dialectical Dutch robbe. But from there? It’s, well, a rabbit hole.

Walloon is a French dialect spoken by people chiefly in southern and southeastern Belgium and adjacent regions in France.

Curious about the difference between a rabbit and a hare? We’ve got you covered!

girl

Now this one’s really packs the etymological punch.

First, the word girl—generally meaning “a female child”—originally meant any “child” or “young person,” regardless of gender.

Girl, for “child,” is recorded around 1250–1300. The deeper roots of the word, however, are uncertain.

Scholars point to Old English words like gyrela, “an item of dress, apparel,” presumably of a type worn by—and then popularly associated with—a young person back in the day.

boy

Boy oh boy, mystery loves company, apparently!

Girl‘s counterpart, boy, is also obscure. Like girl, boy is also dated to around 1250–1300.

We have some clues to the roots of boy. It might be based on the Old English Bōia, a male given name. Boy is related to the Frisian boi,
“young man,” and the German Bube, “knave, boy, lad.” (Spoken in the northern Netherlands, Frisian is the Germanic language most closely related to English.)

That German sense of “knave” is interesting because among the earliest senses of boy was “male servant.”

slang

There isn’t a person alive that doesn’t use slang in one form or another.

Defined as “very informal usage in vocabulary and idiom that is characteristically more metaphorical, playful, elliptical, vivid, and ephemeral than ordinary language,” slang is the bad boy of our vocab.

Rebelliously enough, the origin of the word slang is unruly as well. The word is first recorded around 1750–60, and was used early on for the special, secret language of the underground, often referred to as thieves’ cant.

One historic, but now rejected, theory connected slang to sling, imagining slang as the kind of language that’s tossed or thrown around. Another theory links slang to another sense of slang, meaning a “narrow strip of land,” which became associated with the territory traveled by hawkers and the speech they used.

stubborn

The origin of stubborn is itself fittingly stubborn, or “unreasonably obstinate.”

We might guess stubborn is connected to stub, a “short, projecting part or remaining piece” that we can imagine is immovable and unyielding. But that just doesn’t appear to be the case.

Stubborn is recorded around 1350–1400 and took such forms as stiborn(e), styborne, and stuborn. And from there, we just don’t really know. Thanks, stubborn.

gawk

We’ve all gawked, or “stared stupidly,” at spectacles, from skyscrapers to Super Bowl halftime mishaps.

Word nerds gawk at origin of gawk—because it’s, you guessed it, something of a puzzle.

Gawk is recorded in 1775–85 in American English. It’s thought that gawk is based on an Old English word meaning “fool,” which appears in gawk hand or gallock hand, referring to the left hand. Sorry, lefties.

Another idea is that gawk is based on gaw, an old word meaning “to gaze, stare,” with that final –k a suffix in appearing in such other words as talk and stalk.

traipse

Traipse generally means “to wander aimlessly or idly while never reaching one’s goal,” as in Last night, they traipsed all over town trying to find a place still open to make copies.

Well, you’ll be doing a lot of traipsing if you try to find the origin of traipse.

The word is first evidenced around 1585–95. The word is thought to be related to the verb tramp, and one can indeed traipse, or “walk over,” something, like fields or flowers. Another theory connects traipse to trespass, which comes from French.

nudge

To nudge is “to push slightly or gently, specifically with an elbow when doing so literally, in order to get someone’s attention or to prod someone along.” A nudge is also a noun, meaning “a slight or gentle push or jog, especially with the elbow.”

Now, the origin of the word nudge could certainly stand to budge, as its origin is generally considered obscure.

We trace nudge, found by 1665–75, back to a dialectical variant of knidge or nidge, related to the Old English cnucian or cnocian, meaning to knock. Knead is a similarly hands-y, poke-y sort of word.

Sometimes, maybe a stubborn word origin just needs a little … nudge.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This incomplete list is not intended to be exhaustive.

This is a list of common contemporary false etymologies for English words.

Profanity[edit]

• Crap: The word «crap» did not originate as a back-formation of British plumber Thomas Crapper’s surname, nor does his name originate from the word «crap», although the surname may have helped popularize the word.^[1][2] The surname «Crapper» is a variant of «Cropper», which originally referred to someone who harvested crops.^[3][4] The word «crap» ultimately comes from Medieval Latin crappa, meaning «chaff».^[5]
• Fuck: The word «fuck» did not originate as an acronym of «For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge», either as a sign posted above adulterers in the stocks, or as a criminal charge against members of the British Armed Forces; nor did it originate during the 15th-century Battle of Agincourt as a corruption of «pluck yew» (an idiom falsely attributed to the English for drawing a longbow).^[6][7][8] The word did not originate in Christianized Anglo-Saxon England as an acronym of «Fornication Under Consent of King»; Modern English was not spoken until the 16th century, and words such as «fornication» and «consent» did not exist in any form in English until the influence of Anglo-Norman in the late 12th century. The earliest recorded use of «fuck» in English comes from c. 1475, in the poem Flen flyys, where it is spelled fuccant (conjugated as if a Latin verb meaning «they fuck»). The word derived from Proto-Germanic roots, and has cognates in many other Germanic languages.^[9][10][11]
• Shit: The word «shit» did not originate as an acronym for «Ship High in Transit», a label falsely said to have been used on shipments of manure to prevent them from becoming waterlogged and releasing explosive methane gas.^[8][12] The word comes from Old English scitte, and is of Proto-Germanic origin.^[13][14]

Ethnic slurs[edit]

• Cracker: The use of «cracker» as a pejorative term for a white person does not come from the use of bullwhips by whites against slaves in the Atlantic slave trade. The term comes from an old sense of «boaster» or «braggart»; alternatively, it may come from «corn-cracker».^[15]
• Gringo: The word «gringo» (a pejorative term for a white American) did not originate during the Mexican–American War (1846–1848), the Venezuelan War of Independence (1811–1823), the Mexican Revolution (1910–1920), or in the American Old West (c. 1865–1899) as a corruption of the lyrics «green grow» in either «Green Grow the Lilacs» or «Green Grow the Rushes, O» sung by American soldiers or cowboys; nor did it originate during any of these times as a corruption of «Green go home!», falsely said to have been shouted at green-clad American troops, or of «green coats» as a description of their uniforms. The word originally simply meant «foreigner» and is probably a corruption of Spanish griego, «Greek».^[16]
• Niggardly: The word «niggardly», meaning stingy or miserly, is not actually related to the racial slur «nigger», despite the similar sound. Like «niggle», it may derive from Old Norse nigla, meaning «to fuss about small matters»;^[17] alternatively, it may derive from another Germanic root meaning «exact» or «careful».^[18] Meanwhile, «nigger», like «Negro», traces back to Latin niger, meaning «black».^[19]
• Redneck: A «sometimes disparaging» term for a «white member of the Southern rural laboring class.»^[20] Several sources^[21][22] have reported an incorrect origin story for the term as used in this sense: that it was first used to describe striking miners who tied red bandanas around their necks during the Battle of Blair Mountain in 1921. However, The Oxford English Dictionary attests to uses in the relevant sense at least as early as 1830.^[23][24]
• Spic: The word «spic» (a pejorative term for a Latino) did not originate as an abbreviation of «Hispanic»; nor as an acronym for «Spanish, Indian, and Colored» (in reference to minority races in the United States); nor as an acronym for «Spanish, Polish, Italian, and Chinese», falsely said to have been used by U.S. immigration officials in the 1940s, 1950s, or 1960s to categorize citizenship applications. The American Heritage Dictionary claims that the word is derived from «spiggoty», possibly from the Spanglish phrase «No speak the English».^[25]
• Wog: The cacophemism «wog», for a foreigner or person of colour, is sometimes believed to be an acronym for «wily Oriental gentleman». It is more likely to be a shortening of «golliwog».^[26]
• Wop: The word «wop» (a pejorative term for an Italian) was not originally an acronym for «without passport»^[8] or «working off passage». It is a corruption of dialectal Italian guappo, «thug».^[27]

Acronyms[edit]

The use of acronyms to create new words was nearly non-existent in English until the middle of the 20th century. Nearly all older words were formed in other ways.^[28]

• «Chav»: see under «Other»
• Coma: Some falsely believe that the word coma originates from «cessation of motor activity». Although this describes the condition of coma, this is not the true derivation. The word is actually derived from the Greek kōma, meaning deep sleep.^[29]
• Fuck: see under «Profanity»
• Golf: did not originate as an acronym of «gentlemen only, ladies forbidden».^[30] The word’s true origin is unknown, but it existed in the Middle Scots period.^[31][32]
• News: The word news has been claimed to be an acronym of the four cardinal directions (north, east, west, and south). However, old spellings of the word varied widely (e.g., newesse, newis, nevis, neus, newys, niewes, newis, nues, etc.). Additionally, an identical term exists in French, «les nouvelles», which translates as the plural of «the new». «News» also does not stand for «notable events, weather, and sports». The word «news» is simply a plural form of new.
• Pom or pommy is an Australian English, New Zealand English, and South African English term for a person of British descent or origin. The exact origins of the term remain obscure (see here for further information). A legend persists that the term arises from the acronym P.O.M.E., for «prisoner of Mother England» (or P.O.H.M, «prisoners of His/Her Majesty»), although there is no evidence to support this assertion.
• Posh was not an acronym for wealthy British passengers getting «port out, starboard home» cabins on ocean liners to India, in order to get ocean breeze. The actual origins of the word are unknown.
• Shit: see under «Profanity»
• Swag is not an acronym for «stuff we all get,» «secretly we are gay,» or anything else. It comes from early-19th-century slang for a thief’s booty or loot.^[33][34]
• Tip is not derived from the phrase «to insure promptness» (prompt service).^[35] The word originated in the 17th century and is of uncertain origin.^[36]
• Wog and wop: see under «Ethnic slurs»

Idioms[edit]

• Rule of thumb is not derived from a medieval constraint on the thickness of an object with which one might beat one’s wife.^[37][38] More likely it means that the thumb can be used to measure an approximate inch.^[39]
• Whole nine yards: The actual origin of the phrase «the whole nine yards» is a mystery, and nearly all claimed explanations are easily proven false. Incorrect explanations include the length of machine gun belts, the capacity of concrete mixers (in cubic yards), various types of fabric, and many other explanations. All are probably false, since most rely on nine yards when evidence suggests that the phrase began as «the whole six yards». In addition, the phrase appeared in print as early as 1907, while many explanations require a much later date of origin.

Other[edit]

• 420 did not originate as the Los Angeles police or penal code for marijuana use.^[40] Police Code 420 is «juvenile disturbance»,^[41] and Penal Code 420 defines the prevention, hindrance, or obstruction of legal «entry, settlement, or residence» on «any tract of public land» as a misdemeanor.^[42] Some LA police codes that do relate to illegal drugs include 10-50 («under influence of drugs»), 966 («drug deal»), 11300 («narcotics»), and 23105 («driver under narcotics»).^[43][44] The number’s association with marijuana originated with a group of students who would meet on the campus of San Rafael High School at 4:20 pm to smoke.^[45]
• Adamant is often believed to have come from Latin adamare, meaning to love to excess. It is in fact derived from Greek ἀδάμας, meaning indomitable. There was a further confusion about whether the substance referred to is diamond or lodestone.
• Buck: The use of «buck» to mean «dollar» did not originate from a practice of referring to African slaves as «bucks» (male deer) when trading.^[46] «Buck» was originally short for «buckskin», as buckskins were used in trade.^[47]
• Butterfly: The word «butterfly» did not originate from «flutterby». It is, as it appears, a compound of «butter» and «fly», first formed in Old English: it comes from the Middle English word butterflye, which in turn comes from the Old English word butorflēoge.^[48][49][50]
• Chav: This disparaging UK term for a person of low social class or graces does not originate from «Chatham-» or «Cheltenham Average», nor is it an acronym for «Council Housed And Violent». It comes from a word meaning «boy» in the Romani language.^{[51][52][53][54]}
• Crowbar: A «crowbar» is not so named for its use by Black menial workers,^[55] but rather for its forked end, which resembles a crow’s foot.^[56]
• Emoji: These pictographic characters are often mistakenly believed to be a simplified form of the word emoticon, itself a portmanteau of «emotion icon».^{[citation needed]} However, emoji is a Japanese term composed from «e» (image) and «moji» (character).^[57]
• Faggot: The origin of the slur usage of the word «faggot» (originally referring to a bundle of firewood) may be from the term for women used in a similar way to «baggage», i.e. something heavy to be dealt with.^{[citation needed]} The usage may also have been influenced by the British term «fag», meaning a younger schoolboy who acts as an older schoolboy’s servant.^[58]
• Female and male: the terms have different etymologies. Male originates from Old French masle, a shortened form of Latin masculus. Female originates from Medieval Latin femella, a diminutive of femina.
• The Fluorescent lamp did not derive its name from the fictional Filipino inventor Agapito Flores.
• Handicap: The word «handicap» did not originate as a metathetic corruption of «cap in hand» in reference to disabled beggars.^[59] The word originally referred to the game hand-i’-cap, in which forfeits were placed in a cap to equalize the game.^[60][61]
• Hiccough, an alternate spelling still encountered for hiccup, originates in an assumption that the second syllable was originally cough. The word is in fact onomatopoeic in origin.
• History does not derive from «His story» (that is, a version of the past from which the acts of women and girls are systemically excluded) but from the Greek word ἱστορία, historia, meaning «inquiry.»
• Innocent: often wrongly believed to have the original meaning of «not knowing», as if it came from Latin noscere (to know); in fact it comes from nocere (to harm), so the primary sense is «harmless».
• Isle and island: The word «isle» is not short for «island», nor is the word «island» an extension of «isle»; the words are unrelated.^[62][63] «Isle» comes ultimately from Latin īnsula, meaning «island»; «island» comes ultimately from Old English īegland, also meaning «island», or technically «island land» (cf. Icelandic ey «island»). The spelling island with an S, however, is indeed due to the influence of isle.
• Marmalade: there is an apocryphal story that Mary, Queen of Scots, ate it when she had a headache, and that the name is derived from her maids’ whisper of «Marie est malade» (Mary is ill). In fact it is derived from Portuguese marmelada, meaning quince jam, and then expanded from quince jam to other fruit preserves. It is found in English-language sources written before Mary was even born.^[64]
• Nasty: The term nasty was not derived from the surname of Thomas Nast as a reference to his biting, vitriolic cartoons. The word may be related to the Dutch word nestig, or «dirty».^[65] It predates Nast by several centuries, appearing in the most famous sentence of Thomas Hobbes’s Leviathan, that in the state of nature, the life of man is «solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short». That work was published in 1651, whereas Nast was born in 1840.
• Picnic: The word «picnic» did not originate as an abbreviation of «pick a nigger», a phrase falsely claimed to have been used by white families at community lynchings in the 19th century.^[66] «Picnic» comes from 17th-century French piquenique, which is of uncertain origin.^[67][68]
• Pumpernickel is said to have been given the name by a French man (sometimes Napoleon) referring to his horse, Nicole—»Il étoit bon pour Nicole» («It was good enough for Nicole»), or «C’est une pomme pour Nicole» («It’s an apple for Nicole») or «C’est du pain pour Nicole» («It’s bread for Nicole»). Some dictionaries claim a derivation from the German vernacular Pumpern (fart) and «Nick» (demon or devil), though others disagree.^[69]
• Sincere does not originate from Latin sine cera («without wax»), but from sincerus («true, genuine»), which combines roots meaning «single» and «grow».^[70]
• Snob does not originate from Latin sine nobilitate («without nobility»).^[71]
• Till is not an abbreviation of «until»,^[72] though the increasingly common spelling ’til is a result of this misconception. In fact, «till» is the older word; «until» is a compound of «till» and the Old Norse prefix «und-» («up to», «as far as»^[73]), just as «unto» is a compound of that prefix and «to».^[74]
• Welsh rarebit has been claimed to be the original spelling of the savoury dish «Welsh rabbit». Both forms now have currency, though the form with «rabbit» is in fact the original. Furthermore, the word «Welsh» in this context was used in a pejorative sense, meaning «foreign» or «substandard», and does not indicate that the dish originated in Wales.^[75]
• Woman does not originate from «woven from man», nor from «womb». It came from the Old English wifmann («woman human»), a compound of wif («woman» – cf. «wife») + man («human being»). Adult human males were called wer (as in weregeld, and world, and possibly also be the first element in «werwolf», man-wolf). Mann, the word for «person», eventually came to be used for adult human males specifically.^[76] Both «wer» and «wyf» may be used to qualify «man», for example:

God gesceop ða æt fruman twegen men, wer and wif
(then at the beginning, God created two human beings, man and woman)^[77]

See also[edit]

• List of common English usage misconceptions
• List of common misconceptions#Language

References[edit]

The English word-stock
consists of several extensive strata, the origin of which corresponds
to historical and cultural development of the English society. The
British Isles used to be conquered by foreign invaders from time to
time which resulted in the mixed character of the vocabulary and this
makes most particular feature of the English language. Unlike
lexical system, the grammar and phonetic system are very stable
(unchangeable) and are not often influenced by other languages. A
native word is a word which belongs to the original English stock,
i.e. of Anglo-Saxon origin. Borrowed words are words taken over from
other languages. The etymological linguistic analysis showed that the
borrowed stock of words is larger than the native stock of words. In
fact native words comprise only 30% of the total number of words in
the English vocabulary. The number 30 characterizes the quantity of
native words in the vocabulary, but doesn’t give an idea of their
frequency and semantic value.

There
are the following basic layers of vocabulary in the English language
(English belongs
to the West Germanic subbranch of languages).

Native words

1.
Words from
Indo-European stock make the basis of Germanic word-stock. Words of
Indo-European origin belong to very important semantic groups. They
play an important role in the English language as they have high
frequency value, great word-forming power, wide collocability, many
meanings and they are stylistically neutral. They include:

—
pronouns: I,
he,
my,
your,
his,
who,
whose;

—
numerals: one
two three,
four,
five,
six;

—
prepositions: in,
out,
on,
under,
for,
of;

—
conjunctions: and,
but,
till,
as;

—
most of the auxiliary and modal verbs: shall,
will,
should,
must,
can,
may;

—
members
of a family: father,
mother,
brother,
son
(e.g.
English mother,
Sanskrit mātar,
Greek mātēr,
Latin māter);

—
words denoting parts of body: head,
hand,
arm,
back,
foot,
eye
(e.g.
English nose,
Sanskrit
nāsā,
Latin
nasus,
German Nase);

—
animals: horse,
cow,
sheep,
cat
(e.g. English ewe,
Sanskrit ávih,
Greek
ó(v)is,
Latin ovis);

—
natural phenomena, planets, plants, substances: snow,
rain,
wind,
sun,
moon
(e.g. English night,
Russian ночь,
Sanskrit nakti,
Greek nýx,
German Nacht);

—
some common adjectives (e.g. Russian новый,
Sanskrit návas,
Greek ne(v)os,
Latin novus,
German neu);

—
common actions: do,
make,
go,
come,
hear,
see,
eat,
speak,
talk
(e.g.
Russian видеть,
ведать,
Sanskrit víd
«знать»,
Greek (v)idein,
Latin vidēre).

2.
Words from Common Germanic language, that have cognates in other West
Germanic languages, e.g. English
wife,
German Weib;
English bride,
German Braut,
Gothic bruÞs,
Old Norse brúÞr;
English house,
German Haus,
Dutch huis,
Norwegian hus,
Swedisg hus.

3.
Some isolated words (or words of unknown origin), which are found
only in English
girl,
bad,
keep.

Many
words of native origin possess large clusters of derived and compound
words in the present-day language, e.g. help
– helper,
helpful,
helpfully,
helpfulness,
helping,
helpingly,
helpable,
helpably,
helped,
unhelpable.

Borrowings
(borrowed
words)

Borrowing – 1) (process)
resorting to the word-stock of other languages for words to express
new concepts, to further differentiate the existing concepts and to
name new objects, etc.; 2) (result) a loan word, borrowed word – a
word taken over from another language and modified in phonemic shape,
spelling, paradigm or meaning according to the standards of the
receiving language.

The following types of
borrowed words can be distinguished:

—
loan words proper – the sound-form and the meaning are borrowed
together (sky
– Scandinavian, to
dance
– French);

—
translation loans – patterns taken from another language are filled
with native English material (English motorway
calques German Autobahn,
mother-tongue
calques
Latin Lingua
materna);

—
semantic loans – a new sense of an English word that appeared under
the influence of a related word in another language. Examples
from
Russian,
звезда,
идол (идол
русского рока),
агрессивный
(У песни хорошая агрессия).

One
should distinguish between the terms “origin of borrowing” and
“source of borrowing”. The source of borrowing is a language from
which the word was borrowed from. The term “origin of borrowing
refers to the language in which the word originated. Let us study the
origin of the word paper,
for instance. It made its appearance in English the following way:
English paper
< French papier
< Latin papyrus
< Greek papyros.
The word originated from Greek but it was borrowed from French.

Assimilation
of
borrowings
is the process of change that a borrowed word undergoes while being
adopted to the phonetic (stress, pronunciation reason,
fillet),
grammatical (the acquisition of new grammatical forms on analogy with
other English words sputnik(s),
kindergarten (s),
imbroglio(s)), semantic (development of new senses in the borrowed
word: suite,
n – 1) ‘a
set of rooms’ a
luxury suite;
2) computing ‘a set of programs with a uniform design and the
ability to share data’ a
PC),
morphological (word-building paradigms
elite,
elitism,
elitist)
and
graphical (décor,
decor)
systems of the host language. The degree of assimilation depends on
the importance, frequency, length of use of borrowings and way of
borrowing (oral or written). Words that enter the receiving language
orally tend to assimilate to a more extent (phonetically,
morphologically) rather than those which were borrowed through
written speech. The latter are longer felt as foreign words and often
function as a special feature of this or that style. According to the
degree of assimilation borrowings fall into the following types:

—
complete
loans
are words undistinguished from native words,
they completely assume word-building and word-changing paradigms
gates,
eggs,
knives,
roots;

—
partial
loans
are phonetically (police),
graphically (staphylococci,
psychosis,
phalanx,
gourmet)
or grammatically (е.g.
datum
– data,
criterion – criteria,
index – indexes/ indices)
unassimilated words which are perceived as foreign and refer to
bookish style;

• unassimilated
  words (barbarisms),
  e.g. ad-lib
  «импровизация»,
  déjà
  vu «парамнезия,
  ложная
  память»,
  hors d’oeuvre «закуска»,
  qigong «цигун,
  дыхательная
  гимнастика»,
  chef d’oeuvre «шедевр,
  лучшая
  работа,
  которую
  сделал
  мастер».

The English word-stock
borrowed words from many languages such as Scandinavian, French,
Latin, Greek and others. Let’s study these groups in detail.

1.
Latin borrowings.

Latin
was one of the first languages to contact English and enrich it with
borrowings. The English language contacted Latin several times.

The
first layer is made up by continental loans which were borrowed from
Latin during the period when the British Isles were a part of the
Roman Empire (before AD 449). They are everyday words, mostly nouns
such as Latin.
vinum
– English
wine,
uncia – inch,
castra – Manchester,
stræt – street,
vallum – wall,
portus – port.

Many
Latin words came into English during the Adoption of Christianity in
the 6^th
century. At this time the Latin alphabet was borrowed which ousted
the Runic alphabet. These borrowings are usually called classical
borrowings. Here belong learned Latin words, connected with religion
bishop,
apostle,
cross,
education school,
dean,
and some others cancer,
cap,
alter.

Many Greek words were borrowed through Latin: church,
angel,
devil,
anthem.

Latin
and Greek borrowings appeared in English during the Middle English
period due to the Great Revival of Learning. These are mostly
scientific words because Latin was the language of science at the
time. These words were not used as frequently as the words of the Old
English period, therefore some of them were partly assimilated
grammatically, e.g. formula
– formulae.
Here also belong such words as: cordial,
obvious,
frigid,
absent,
correct,
desperate,
to neglect,
to contribute,
to comprehend,
memorandum,
minimum,
maximum,
veto.

2.
Scandinavian borrowings.

By
the end of the Old English period (VIII c.) English underwent a
strong influence of Scandinavian due to the Scandinavian conquest of
the British Isles. Scandinavians belonged to the same group of
peoples as Anglo-Saxons and their languages had much in common. As
the result of this conquest there are about 700 borrowings from
Scandinavian into English such nouns as sister,
bull,
cake,
egg,
kid,
knife,
skirt,
dirt,
window,
such adjectives as: flat,
ill,
happy,
low,
odd,
ugly,
wrong,
such verbs as: call,
die,
guess,
get,
give,
scream
and many others. What is special about Scandinavian influence is that
the way of borrowing was oral in form; the contact was
long and stable and the Scandinavian borrowings don’t denote new
notions,
e.g. Scandinavian husbonda
> husband,
taka
> takan > take
(earlier
niman).

Even
some pronouns and connective words were borrowed which happens very
seldom, such as: same,
both,
till,
fro,
though,
and pronominal forms with ‘th’: they,
them,
their.
Scandinavian influenced the development of phrasal verbs, which did
not exist in Old English, at the same time some prefixed verbs came
out of usage, e.g. ofniman,
beniman.
Phrasal verbs are now highly productive in English, e.g. take
off,
give in.
The phonetic process of assibilation (when an obstruent sound becomes
a sibilant one), which occurred in Old English and didn’t take
place in Scandinavian, many etymological doublets appeared, e.g.
skirt
– shirt,
shatter – scatter.
The
borrowed lexical elements stayed in toponymy, e.g. Scandinavian byr
«деревня»
– Derby.

3.
French borrowings.

French
influence began with Battle of Hastings (1066), in which William the
Conqueror defeated King Harold. French became an official language
and English was used by lower classes. Up to the 14^th
century borrowings came from the Norman dialect, and since the 14^th
century – from Parisian dialect of French.

There
are the following semantic groups of French borrowings:

—
words relating to government: administer,
empire,
state,
government;

—
words relating to court: court,
servant,
guard,
royal,
prince;
BUT king
& queen are
native;

• words
  relating to military affairs: army,
  war,
  banner,
  victory,
  soldier,
  battle;
  BUT knight
  is
  of native origin;

—
words relating to jury: justice,
judge,
prison,
lien,
advocate,
petition,
inquest,
sentence,
barrister;

• words
  relating to religion:
  religion,
  sermon,
  saint;

—
words relating to fashion: luxury,
coat,
collar,
lace,
pleat,
embroidery;

• town
  trades: tailor,
  butcher,
  painter,
  BUT country trades – smith,
  shepherd;

—
words relating to jewelry: topaz,
emerald,
ruby,
pearl;

—
words relating to food and cooking: lunch,
dinner,
appetite,
to roast,
to stew
BUT swine.

Many
English-French synonymic pairs appear as a result of borrowing, they
differ in meaning and use, e.g. life
– existence,
tongue – language,
ship – vessel,
mouth
– oral,
tooth – dental.

French
influenced not only the vocabulary of English but also its spelling,
because they were French scribes who wrote documents as the local
population was mainly illiterate, and the ruling class was French.
Runic letters remaining in English after the Latin alphabet was
borrowed were substituted by Latin letters and combinations of
letters, e.g. ‘v’ was introduced for the voiced consonant [v]
instead of ‘f’ in the intervocal position lufian
– ‘love’, the digraph ‘ch’ was introduced to denote the
sound [tʃ]
instead of the letter ‘c’ as in chest
before
front vowels where it had been palatalized, the digraph ‘sh’ was
introduced instead of the combination ‘sc’ to denote the sound
[ʃ]
as in ship,
the digraph ‘th’ was introduced instead of the Runic letters ‘θ’
and ‘þ’ as in this,
thing,
the letter ‘y’ was introduced instead of the Runic letter ‘γ’
to denote the sound [j] as in yet,
the digraph ‘qu’ substituted the combination ‘cw’ to denote
the combination of sounds [kw] as in queen,
the digraph ‘ou’ was introduced to denote the sound [u:] as in
house
(The sound [u:] was later on diphthongized and is pronounced [au] in
native words and fully assimilated borrowings). As it was difficult
for French scribes to copy English texts they substituted the letter
‘u’ before ‘v’, ‘m’, ‘n’ and the digraph ‘th’ by
the letter ‘o’ to escape the combination of many vertical lines
sunu
– ‘son’,
luvu
– ‘love’.

Words
were borrowed from French into English after 1650, mainly through
French literature, but they were not as numerous and many of them are
not completely assimilated. There are the following semantic groups
of these borrowings:

a) literature,
music, theatre: belle-lettres,
conservatorie,
brochure,
nuance,
piruette,
vaudeville,
matinee;

b) military
affairs: corps,
echelon,
fuselage,
manouvre;

c) buildings
and furniture: entresol,
chateau,
bureau;

d) food
and cooking: ragout,
cuisine,
gourmand.

Thus,
the share of Roman borrowings in the English word-stock is
exceedingly large. We mean words denoting basic notions which are
expressed be native words in other languages. Such borrowings go back
to Middle English, e.g. table,
chair,
air,
river,
money,
city,
language,
victory,
dictionary.
The
total number of French and Latin loans into English is about 57%.
Many Latin words entered English through French. Most of these words
are terms and learned words possessing low frequency.

4.
Other sources.

Italian
borrowings.

Cultural
and trade relations between Italy and England brought many Italian
words into English. The earliest Italian borrowing came into English
in the 14-th century, it was the word bank
which originated from the Italian banko
– ‘bench’. Italian moneylenders and moneychangers sat in the
streets on benches. When they suffered losses they turned over their
benches, it was called banco
rotta
from which the English word bankrupt
originated. In the 17-th century some geological terms were borrowed:
volcano,
granite,
bronze,
lava.
At the same time some political terms were borrowed: manifesto,
bulletin.

But
mostly Italian is famous by its influence in music and in all
Indo-European languages musical terms were borrowed from Italian:
alto,
baritone,
basso,
tenor,
falsetto,
solo,
duet,
trio,
quartet,
quintet,
opera,
operetta,
libretto,
piano,
violin.

Among
the 20-th century Italian borrowings we can mention: gazette,
incognito,
altostratus,
fiasco,
fascist,
dilettante,
grotesque,
graffito,
cartoon,
lagoon,
etc.

Spanish
borrowings.

Spanish
borrowings came into English mainly through its American variant.
There are the following semantic groups of them:

a) trade
terms: cargo,
embargo;

b) names
of dances and musical instruments: tango,
rumba,
habanera,
guitar;

c) names
of vegetables and fruit: tomato,
potato,
tobacco,
cocoa,
banana,
ananas,
apricot;

d) ethnic
customs: parade,
matador.

German
borrowings.

There
are some 800 words borrowed from German into English. Some of them
have classical roots, e.g. in some geological terms, such as: cobalt,
bismuth,
zink,
quarts,
gneiss,
wolfram.
There were also words denoting objects used in everyday life which
were borrowed from German:  iceberg,
lobby,
rucksack,
Kindergarten.In
the period of the Second World War the following words were borrowed:
Volkssturm,
Luftwaffe,
SS-man,
Bundeswehr,
gestapo,
gas chamber
and many others. After the Second World War the following words
were borrowed: Berufsverbot,
Volkswagen.

Holland
borrowings.

Holland
and England have constant interrelations for many centuries and more
than 2000 Holland borrowings were borrowed into English. Most of them
are nautical terms and were mainly borrowed in the 14-th century,
such as freight,
skipper,
pump,
keel,
dock,
reef,
deck,
leak,
cruise,
buoy.
Others
refer to the sphere of painting such as easel,
sketch.

Russian
borrowings.

There
were constant contacts between England and Russia and they borrowed
words from one language into the other. Among early Russian
borrowings there are mainly words connected with trade relations,
such as: rouble,
copeck,
pood,
sterlet,
vodka,
sable,
and also words relating to nature, such as: taiga,
tundra,
steppe.

There
is also a large group of Russian borrowings which came into English
through Rushian literature of the 19-th century, such as Narodnik,
moujik,
duma,
zemstvo,
volost,
ukase,
and also words which were formed in Russian with Latin roots, such as
nihilist,
intelligenzia,
Decembrist.

After
the Great October Revolution many new words appeared in Russian
connected with the new political system, new culture, and many of
them were borrowed into English, such as collectivization, 
udarnik,
Komsomol
and also translation loans, such as shock
worker,
collective farm, 
five-year plan.

One
more group of Russian borrowings is connected with perestroika and
Russian history of latest decades, such as glasnost,
nomenklatura,
apparatchik,
siloviki.

Borrowings
continue to appear in Modern English as well. Mostly they are words
formed with the help of Latin and Greek morphemes. There are quite a
lot of them in medicine (appendicitis,
aspirin),
in chemistry (acid,
valency,
alkali),
in technology (engine,
antenna,
biplane,
airdrome),
in politics (socialism,
militarism),
names of sciences (zoology,
physics).
In philology most of terms are of Greek origin (homonym,
archaism,
lexicography).

Plenty
of borrowing into English led to appearance of the so-called
etymological doublets.
Etymological
doublets
are two words which were derived from the same basic word but by
different routs. They differ in sound-form and meaning. For example,
the words shirt and skirt are of Germanic origin, but the latter was
borrowed from Scandinavian, that’s why the initial letter
combination (sk)
hadn’t been palatalized. Some doublets developed within the English
language itself, such as Old English sceadu
developed into shade,
but its indirect case sceadwa
resulted in Modern English shadow.
Many etymolofical doublets are pairs where one word was borrowed
directly from Latin and the other – from French, e.g. camera
– chamber.

Some
borrowings can be called international
words,
if they coincide in form and meaning with words of other languages,
especially non-cognate ones. These are terms of science, technology,
politics, culture, e.g. actual,
fact,
sonnet,
democracy,
capitalism,
и
т.д.