Word of the Day

Andiron “one of a pair of metal stands for holding logs in a fireplace” may be a common noun, but its history is anything but typical. Andiron derives by way of Anglo-French from Old French andier, with a change in spelling and pronunciation because of an association with the unrelated English noun iron. Prior to Old French, the history of andiron is unclear; the most frequently appearing hypothesis is a derivation from Gaulish anderos “young animal,” after the use of decorative animal heads on andirons, but this connection remains unproven. If the link is valid, andiron is a distant cognate with the words for “bull” and “heifer” in several modern Celtic languages, such as Breton and Welsh. Andiron was first recorded in English in the late 13th century.

Avouch “to make frank acknowledgment of” is derived by way of Middle French avouchier from Latin advocāre “to call to one’s aid.” Advocāre is also the source of advocate (as well as French avocat and Spanish abogado, both meaning “lawyer”) and comes from Latin vōx “voice.” Two doublets of avouch are the similar-sounding avow “to declare frankly and openly” and vouch “to support as being true,” both of which are also derived from advocāre, but even more surprising is that vow “to pledge or resolve solemnly to do” is not related to this family of verbs. Instead, vow comes from Latin vovēre (stem vōt-) “to vow,” which is also the source of vote. Avouch was first recorded in English in the late 14th century.

Bipartisan “representing members from two parties” is a compound of the combining form bi- “twice, two” and the adjective partisan “partial to a specific party.” Partisan comes by way of Middle French from dialectal northern Italian parteźan, which corresponds to standard Italian partigiano and is formed from the noun parte “faction, part” and the suffix -eźan (also -esano, -isano), an adjectival suffix that appears in standard Italian as -igiano. The element -igiano, which appears in nouns of occupation and adjectives of location, often becomes -esan or -isan in words borrowed into English by way of French; just as artisan derives from Italian artigiano, so does courtesan from Italian cortigiana, and for fans of Italian cuisine, this pattern explains how Italian parmigiano “from Parma” has become parmesan in English. Bipartisan was first recorded in English in the first decade of the 20th century.

Cordiform “in the shape of a heart” is a compound of two combining forms: cord- “heart” and -form “shape.” The stem cord- derives from Latin cor, of the same meaning, which is a distant cognate of English heart. As we learned in the etymologies of the recent Words of the Day corvine and pruinose, the Indo-European languages English and Latin share some predictable sound correspondences, and one of the best-known methods of predicting these correspondences is Grimm’s law. Named after the linguist and folklorist Jakob Grimm (of the Brothers Grimm and their fairy tales), Grimm’s law identifies a common pattern: the voiceless stops k (or c), p, and t in Latin and Ancient Greek frequently correspond to the voiceless fricatives h, f, and th in English. In addition to Latin cor and Ancient Greek kardía, which correspond to English heart, we can see this pattern in Latin pater and Ancient Greek patḗr vs. English father. Cordiform was first recorded in English in the 1750s.

Quoth “said,” despite the similar spelling, is not related to quote. While quote derives from Medieval Latin quotāre “to divide (into chapters or verses),” quoth is the past tense of the obsolete verb quethe, from Old English cwethan “to say.” The verb bequeath “to dispose of by last will” and the noun bequest “a disposition in a will” also stem from this Old English verb. Quoth has a few other cognates in modern Germanic languages, such as Icelandic kvetha “to say, chant,” but is otherwise isolated, with no other likely relatives in Ancient Greek, Latin, or Sanskrit. Quoth was first recorded in English in the late 12th century.