r/etymology

My students are interested about what the president has been saying. Thank you!

Ive noticed pretty much all christian names that have j in it (joseph, jacob, etc.) have h instead in armenian (hovsepian, hacob)

Now i dont know a lot about armenian but i skimmed some wiki pages and a bit of a paper on the phonologial development of armenian but i could find no such j to h shift and also it seems like a pretty strange soundchange that i dont recall ever seeing in another language, so why is this the case? And do other borrowings that arent names also display this shit?

In a lot of dictionaries including Oxford and Wiktionary, creature has two opposing meanings (among many more):

"A living ‘creature’ or created being, an animate being; an animal; often as distinct from ‘man’."

"A human being; a person or individual (as in ‘every creature in the room’). Common in the phrase ‘our fellow-creatures’. [So F. créature.]"

My question is since both seem to be attested in 1300s, which meaning would be prior to the other.

Hi everyone, I have been interested in this field for a while now. I can't study Etymology academically right now but I do want to study it on my own as a hobby.

How should I start? What is the step by step process? I am currently interested in scientific language the most if thats relevant. Thank you.

Like for describing something that only exists in the future, theoretically.

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I was moving some boxes at work today when I noticed the warning on them (English and French): Fragile Corner/Coin Fragile. It got me wondering if the phrases "coin a term" and "corner the market" come from the same etymology or it's just a coincidence.

i started thinking about why spring isn’t named “verus” or “vernus”, since “autumn” is derived from the latin word “autumnus”, but then i realised summer and winter are also derived from old english (and further derived from old german or sanskrit)! so i propose an idea: what do you guys think about the names spring → vernus/verus, winter → hiem/brum, summer → este (similar to the french word for summer, été)/aestate. this isn’t anything revolutionary or maybe even particularly smart but it’s something that’s been on my mind. i’m a bit of a latin fiend, so i’ve always loved english words that are derived from latin.

p.s. maybe the tag here is supposed to be “meta” instead of “discussion”, i’m new here, so 🤷‍♂️

https://preview.redd.it/dx3c90r3jktg1.jpg?width=1280&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e482774e5a27d58adaf20bfe90f77bd86476d89a

Lately I’ve been noticing that some words sound or look similar, and I start wondering if they’re related or not. The problem is I can’t tell if I’m actually spotting real connections or just overthinking random similarities :) Do you guys have any way of telling the difference, or is it something you just get better at over time?