Language of Confusion: Bad Luck

I’m kind of running out of Halloween adjacent words to look at, so we’re down to words that are just bad luck.

Jinx showed up in 1911, making it a pretty recent word. Well, kind of. It’s origin is weirdly muddied. I say weirdly because there’s a word jynx, but it’s actually not definite that jinx came from it, even though that would make sense. Jynx actually showed up in the mid seventeenth century, where it meant “wryneck”, which is somehow an actual word that I’ve never heard of before—it’s a mix of wry and neck, and apparently a type of bird that was used in “witchcraft and divination”. Jynx is from the Modern Latin jynx, from the classical Latin iynx, and the wryneck bird is a subfamily of woodpeckers that’s called Jyngidae. So to sum up: jinx might be from jynx, a word for a bird called a wryneck that has something to do with magic, because shut up.

Curse comes from the Old English curs/cursian, a curse, so it’s straightforward so far. But then of course no one knows where it came from previously, as there is no Germanic, Romance, or Celtic equivalent. One theory is that it’s from the classical Latin cursus, which means course and is the origin word for course, as cursus could also mean a “set of daily liturgical prayers”. I don’t know. Why not?

Hex showed up in the early-mid nineteenth century in American English, meaning a witch and not a magic spell until the early twentieth century. It’s from the Pennsylvania German hexe, to practice witchcraft, and in proper German, it means witch. That can be traced to the Middle High German hecse/hexse, from the Old High German hagazussa, hag—and yes, that’s the origin word for hag.

Bane comes from the Old English bana, something which causes death, from the Proto Germanic banon. Before that, it’s another big old mystery, although at least this one is somewhat straightforward.

Sources

Online Etymology Dictionary

Google Translate

Omniglot

University of Texas at Austin Linguistic Research Center

Tony Jebson’s page on the Origins of Old English

Old English-English Dictionary

Encyclopaedia Britannica

October Goals

It’s the first day of October! Time to see how I did with my goals last month.

September Goals

1. Well,  now that I’ve started, I might as well finish WIP-2.

As anyone who follows me on Twitter knows, I did it! WHOOO!

2. Maybe actually get around to editing those old stories this time.

Nope. I was too busy editing WIP-1. So it’s kind of a win, just not the one I intended.

3. I should also update my etymology page. I don’t even have the case words up yet.

Yes, got this all taken care of.

So I did pretty good this month. I mean, I will get to those stories eventually. But the longer works take priority.

Anyway, new goals.

October Goals

1. Work on notes and edit WIP-1. I have some rewrites to do, and reorganizing, then I need to get more people to read it. Hint hint.

2. Start an editing plan for WIP-2 and possibly start editing that, depending on how much free time I have.

3. Start writing things like query letters, taglines, and synopses for WIP-1. I can’t believe it’s finally come to this.

So that’s what I want to do this month. What are you up to?

Snuggling

It’s quite insulting, really.

Heaven forbid she actually come up to snuggle on me. No. It was only for the quilt.

Language of Confusion: Perfect Cell, Part III

This is a perfect way to lead into October because a lot of these cell words are surprisingly dark. Now, to remind everyone (as I assume you don’t obsessively retain this information like I do), cell comes from the Proto Indo European kel-, to cover/conceal/save. And that leads to some weird words.

First, the lightest and softest of the words this week (though no less weird): supercilious. It showed up in the mid sixteenth century from the classical Latin superciliosus, from supercilium, which means arrogance, but which literally means eyebrow. See, because arrogance involves raised eyebrows… yeah. The super- means above and the cilium means eyelid and is derived from celare, to hide, a word we talked about in part one that comes from kel-. So because eyebrows cover eyelids, we have supercilious.

Now we get into the weird stuff. Um, weirder. Occult showed up in the mid sixteenth century meaning secret, coming from the Middle French occulte and classical Latin occultus, which means hidden, secret or occult. The o comes from ob-, which means over, and the rest comes from celare. To hide/cover over. Oh, and guess what? This is not where cult comes from. That word has a completely different origin.

Next, kleptomania. Yep, this one, too. It showed up in 1830 (where it was also spelled with a C), coming from mania and and the Greek word kleptes, thieves. That word comes from kleptein, stealing, which is from the Proto Indo European klep-, which is related to kel-. You conceal/save something you steal, right?

I bet you didn’t think apocalypse would be here, but yes, it is. It showed up in the late fourteenth century meaning revelation or disclosure. It comes from the Church Latin apocalypsis, from the Greek apokalyptein, reveal. The apo- means off or away from and the kalyptein means covered, and is from kel-. So it’s away from hiding, to reveal, to apocalypse.

Finally today, we’re looking at hell. Yep, this is where it derived from. It came from the Old English hell (also spelled hel or helle), where it meant “where sinners go”. It’s from the Proto Germanic haljo, the underworld, a “concealed place”. Which is how it came from kel-.

Wild, huh?

Sources

Online Etymology Dictionary

Google Translate

Omniglot

University of Texas at Austin Linguistic Research Center

University of Texas at San Antonio’s page on Proto Indo European language

Tony Jebson’s page on the Origins of Old English

Old English-English Dictionary

University of Ottawa, Canada

From The Spamfiles

Here we go!

I have to admit, I don’t get this one. “I really forgive [you]” (no, I’m not only using u; I’m civilized) means that I can answer them now. “I’ve heard that you are with another person now but I don’t believe her” like… who even are you? Why would I ever respond to this? Are they trying to get me to tell them they have the wrong person and then strike up a conversation that way? Or am I just overthinking this way too much? (we all know I’m over thinking it way too much)

Ugh, I bet it’s all emojis.

For all of you that were worried, here, it seems Greg is still getting mail. I’m sure you’re all relieved. He better get on this, too. His thoughts are vital.

I love how they can never get the punctuation right. Because random periods and dashes are super trustworthy.

Speaking of super trustworthy, here’s ebaY.

Okay, apparently this is in Finnish. And what does it say? “Dearest, I am married to a Kuwaiti Hassan Hajredin to 19 years without children  and my husband died in 2014. I will contact you and inform wanted to donate…” So it’s a widow (I assume she has cancer because they always do) who wants me to donate money for her. But in Finnish!

Downloading

All I want is to download a game. For crying out loud.

Have those stupid things ever correctly estimated how long it would take to download something ever?

Language of Confusion: Perfect Cell, Part II

Remember last week how I started talking about cell (coming from the Proto Indo European kel-, to cover/conceal/save) and it got crazy fast? Yeah. That was just a warm up for this week.

First today, we’re looking at hull. Like on a ship. And also like the outer casing of a seed, because people used to say that ship keels looked like open peapods, although it’s not totally sure that the two are related. The one thing that’s sure is that the seed covering hull comes from the Middle English hol/hole, from the Old English hulu, from the Proto Germanic hulu-, to cover. And that word happens to be from kel-. There’s also hold—not like holding an object, the hold of a ship. A ship hold showed up in the fifteenth century as a corruption of the Middle English holl, the hull of a ship. What? You thought it was because it was something that held cargo? Don’t be ridiculous.

Hall comes from the Old English heall, a large room in a residence where “social and public affairs of the house” take place, and somehow that’s descended from kel-. Maybe the house business was something they wanted concealed? Anyway, it didn’t mean a passageway until the seventeenth century, evolving from a sense that doors to private rooms in the house opened to the large public room. No, I’m not sure how you get from one to the other, I’m just reporting it (hallway came two centuries later, BTW, so that had no influence). Anyway, if you ever wondered why a town hall is called that, it’s because it’s one of the only uses of the word that’s close to the original meaning.

Next, hole. It comes from the Old English hol, which means a cave or pit, coming from the Proto Germanic hulan, which is from kel-. I guess because you can hide things in holes? Also related is hollow, which hole mostly replaced in English. It showed up in the thirteenth century from the Old English holh and Proto Germanic hul-, both of which we can probably assume are from the same words as hole descended from.

Finally today, a helm, as in, the one you’d wear on your head, not like you steer a ship. The word helmet showed up in the mid fifteenth century, and it’s possibly from helm. To be honest, people aren’t totally sure, so it’s just a guess that it’s from helm, which comes from the Old English helm, Proto Germanic helmaz, which is then from kel-. Since a helmet is a covering for the head, you can kind of see it, although not why they dropped the K and replaced it with H.

Sources

Online Etymology Dictionary

Omniglot

University of Texas at Austin Linguistic Research Center

University of Texas at San Antonio’s page on Proto Indo European language

University of Texas at Arlington

Tony Jebson’s page on the Origins of Old English

Old English-English Dictionary