etymology – the quick Sliver

3.8.13 Walks Like a Doc, Talks Like a Doc…

March 8, 2013 Mike Keeler

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OK, time for another installment of “What’s In a Word?” A “salver” is just a glorified tray. The word comes from the Latin “salvare” which means to save something or to prove something is safe. In the Middle Ages, when one of the more popular ways to change a political…

12.7.12 Nog

December 7, 2012 Mike Keeler

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This is where mixology meets etymology. Nobody is quite sure where the name comes from. But the drink has its roots in many forms of milk-and-alcohol libations that were common in Europe since at least the Middle Ages. One such drink was “Posset,” a glass of milk curdled with alcohol,…

2012 America bourbon colonies egg nog England etymology holiday madeira mixology rum

3.18.11 Quality Ground

March 11, 2011 Mike Keeler

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This is how good words go bad. Start with a perfectly good word. Take, for example, “cacher,” which comes from the Latin “coactare – to constrain” and which in French means “to hide or conceal.” But a lot depends on who is doing the concealing. If you or I were…

2011 cache cachet etymology

10.16.09 Word!

October 16, 2009 Mike Keeler

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Today is both National Boss Day AND World Dictionary Day! And so with serendipity comes etymology. The Middle English word for “lump” is “boce.” From that we get “boss,” or protuberance. It’s common on plants and animals, and also in architecture meaning “stud” or ornamental projection. There’s a boss which…

2009 Boss etymology National Boss Day World Dictionary Day