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Saturday, June 23, 2012

RANDOM THOUGHTS #96

Steve Cole muses: Just thinking to himself about the curious origins of common words.

1. Desultory, meaning the lack of a definite plan, or perhaps a series of random actions with no purpose or pattern, comes from desultor, the Latin term for "one who leaps." Roman cavalry were taught to use two horses in a chase, jumping from the tired horse to the fresh one without losing time. For exhibitions, the best Roman cavalrymen could do this across four horses and some even did it between two chariots.

2. Deuce, which means a playing card marked "two" or perhaps slang for "the devil" comes from a Low German term meaning "two" as that was the lowest roll of the dice. (In those days, the earliest dice games were simply who could roll the highest number, and someone who rolled the lowest number -- two, with a pair of dice -- used the term to indicate some evil spirit had brought them back luck.

3. Devil, a name for Satan (or perhaps for one of several minions in a generic sense) comes from the old diabalos, which means "to throw across." (That same word produces diabolical and El Diablo.) Satan (the original Hebrew name) was the adversary of man, and when the bible was translated into Greek the scholars chose diabolos (in the sense of "the accuser") to reflect the meaning.

4. Diadem, another word for a royal crown, comes from the old Persian symbol of royalty, a white band trimmed with blue tied around the head. The Greeks called it a dia demo, meaning "to bind over." They encountered this after Alexander conquered Persia and started wearing Persian clothes in order to be better accepted by his new subjects. The diadem was copied by the Romans, and (as centuries went by) was encrusted with jewels, then made from gold, and finally became the fully ornate crowns seen in museums.

5. Diaper, a washable cloth used to cloth a baby and contain the (ahem) exhaust, began as a pure white robe worn by priests in the 900s. (The Byzantine Greek word means pure white.) By 1400, this cloth had reached England, where it was used as a tablecloth and made of linen. Over time, cotton replaced linen and women (noting the softness and absorbency) cut up old tablecloths for their babies. Eventually, cloth was cut and sold new just for this purpose.

6. Dicker, to bargain for a better price, comes from the old Roman word decuria, meaning ten. The Romans demanded that the German tribes pay tribute in animal pelts, which were bundled into lots of ten. The word (over the centuries) became decura then decher then dycher and finally dicker by the time it got to England. It still meant a bundle of ten (of anything) since larger quantities of anything were in tens to make counting easier. English colonists brought the word to America, where they traded no end of things to the Indians for dickers (bundles of ten hides). The bargaining revolved around how many of something the colonists had to give for each bundle. By 1700, dicker has lost its connection to ten.

7. Diploma, a parchment signifying graduation from college, comes from the old Greek term diplos, or double. Official documents, after being signed and sealed, were folded in half (to protect the ink and wax seals). The Roman government issued no end of diplomas for any number of things (appointments to office, commissions in the Army, and other official documents). The term diplomat then arose as meaning the guy who showed up with a folded document, said document having been issued by the government saying why he had been sent here. From there it is a short step to diplomatic, diplomacy, and so forth.

8. Dirge, a mournful song for the dead, comes from the Latin word diridge, which means "guide" but just happens to be the first word of a Bible verse commonly recited at funerals.

9. Disheveled, which means unkempt or untidy, comes from the old English word (and Latin word) for bald. A woman whose hair was a mess was described as "bald" for some reason no one remembers.

10. Dismal, meaning gloomy or dejected, has two origins. (Possibly, both are true and whatever groups originated each of the terms did so independently and the result is just a coincidence.) The better one is that it comes from French (and Latin) dies malis, meaning evil days. The other is that it refers to the French/Latin disme, meaning the 10% of the harvest one had to give the local lord.