Where did the name Wednesday come from? Surprise, surprise … Wednesday Addams wasn’t the originator of the name. In fact, the name Wednesday actually derives from two mighty but distinct gods. The Old English word for Wednesday indicates that the day was named for the Germanic god Woden. In Romance languages, the name is derived from the Roman god Mercury. (For example, Wednesday is mercredi in French and miercuri …
It’s many kids’ favorite part of Halloween. There’s no feeling quite like waiting for a stranger to open their door so you can scream the words “Trick or treat!” But, why do we say it? What does it actually mean? Where does the phrase trick-or-treat come from? While some identify precursors to trick-or-treating in ancient Celtic customs, modern trick-or-treating is thought to be a custom borrowed …
The Cinderella that English speakers know and love can be traced to the French story Cendrillon, first published in 1697 by Charles Perrault, though Chinese and Greek versions of this classic tale go back to the 9th century CE and 6th century BCE, respectively. Today, there are over 500 variants of Cinderella in Europe alone. It’s no surprise, then, that describing something as a Cinderella …
It’s one of the most versatile words in the English language, but where did the F-word really come from? Originally, the naughtiest of naughty words was actually quite an acceptable word, though no English speaker would say that today.F-ck is believed to have first showed up in written form some time in the 1400s, and it was disguised in a cypher, although it was in use …
We’d like to take a moment to celebrate the man behind A Dictionary of the English Language, the first definitive English dictionary, the famous Samuel Johnson. A Dictionary of the English Language, also called Johnson’s Dictionary, was first published in 1775 and is viewed with reverence by modern lexicographers. Who wrote the first English dictionary? Samuel Johnson created a widely imitated style of biography and literary …
Often an idiom—an expression whose meaning is not predictable from the usual meanings of its parts—can seem like something from Alice in Wonderland. Pardon my French is one of the most colorful idioms that combines the profane with a language associated with love. Where does pardon my French come from? Pardon my French, or excuse my French, is an apology for the use of profanity; the expression dates …
The berry family is a linguistic invention particular to Germanic languages, like English. Other languages, like Spanish and French, do not combine the wide, diverse berry family into one group, but rather have very different words for blackberries, raspberries, blueberries, and strawberries. Where does the word berry come from? The word berry comes from the Old English berie, which originally meant “grape.” As the English language spread …
By Jane Solomon While some people might view emoji as silly little characters, that’s not how we see it. There’s a sophisticated linguistic system in the way people use emoji, and that’s something we take very seriously at Dictionary.com. Emoji are a very real way people are communicating, and who better to think deeply about emoji than a reference source that investigates meaning? In 2018, …
If you aren’t immersed in politics on the daily, through social media, the news, or just casual conversation, you might not be aware that the phrase wag the dog has become pretty poignant political jargon. But, how did it end up in the political lexicon and where did this seemingly innocent-sounding idiom come from? Below is our rendition of the brief history of the word trends …
A group of kids gets together to play a game of tag and nobody wants to be “it.” The children don’t suddenly slip into chaos trying to decide who “it” is going to be—they possess a rhythmic selection procedure, parts of which have probably been around in some form for centuries. It goes something like this: Eenie, meenie, miney, moe, Catch a tiger by the …
