a WWI phrase: ‘san fairy ann’ (‘that doesn’t matter’)

31st Dec 2017.Reading time 6 minutes.

An expression of indifference to, or resigned acceptance of, a state of affairs, ‘san fairy ann’ jocularly represents the French phrase ‘ça ne fait rien’, meaning ‘that doesn’t matter’. It originated in army use on the Western Front during the First World War.

origin of ‘baloney’

30th Dec 2017.Reading time 5 minutes.

‘baloney’ or ‘boloney’: ‘humbug’ and ‘nonsense’—USA, 1922—American-English alteration of ‘bologna (sausage)’, a large smoked sausage made of seasoned mixed meats, from the name of Bologna, a city in northern Italy, where these sausages were first made

the disputed origin of ‘tantrum’

30th Dec 2017.Reading time 8 minutes.

18th century—origin unknown—perhaps originally imitative and comparable to, or derived from, ‘tantara’, denoting the sound of a trumpet, hence an uproar—or from obsolete French ‘trantran’, synonym of ‘tantara’

‘See you later, alligator’ originated in U.S. teenagers’ slang.

29th Dec 2017.Reading time 9 minutes.

The colloquial see you later, alligator, which originated in American English, is a catchphrase used on parting. The expected response is in, or after, a while, crocodile. —Cf. also notes on ‘see you later, agitator’. The earliest instance of see you later, alligator that I have found is from Teenagers’ Slang Expressions Are Explained by […]

origin of ‘jewel’, little plaything, of ‘bijou’, finger-ring

28th Dec 2017.Reading time 5 minutes.

Etymologically, a jewel is a little game, a little plaything: ‘jewel’ is from a French diminutive of ‘jeu’, meaning ‘a game’, ‘a play’. The word ‘bijou’ is from Breton ‘bizou’, meaning ‘a finger-ring’, from ‘biz’, ‘finger’.

European precursors of the American ‘Indian summer’

27th Dec 2017.Reading time 5 minutes.

The name ‘Indian summer’ (late 18th century) reflected the fact that to the Europeans living in the New World, this was a newly-discovered local phenomenon. But similar phenomena were already known in the Old World by various names.

the changing identities of the doryphore

27th Dec 2017.Reading time 11 minutes.

Greek ‘δορυϕόρος’ (‘doruphόros’) meant ‘spearman’; in French, ‘doryphore’ denotes the Colorado beetle and the German occupying forces during WWII; in English, it denotes a pedantic and annoyingly persistent critic.

‘elope’: originally a legal term referring to adultery

26th Dec 2017.Reading time 5 minutes.

The verb ‘elope’ now means ‘to run away secretly in order to get married’, but it originated in Anglo-Norman as a legal term meaning, of a wife, ‘to run away from her husband with a paramour’.

linguistic pondering over ‘Libra’ and ‘pound’

25th Dec 2017.Reading time 3 minutes.

The English noun ‘pound’ is from Latin ‘pondō’, short for ‘lībra pondō’, literally ‘a pound’ (= ‘lībra’) ‘by weight’ (= ‘pondō’)—Latin ‘lībra’ meant ‘the Roman pound of twelve ounces’, and ‘pondō’ was a form of ‘pondus’, meaning ‘weight’.

the queen’s cushion, a Scottish makeshift seat

25th Dec 2017.Reading time 6 minutes.

‘queen’s’, or ‘king’s’, ‘cushion’: a seat made by two people who cross arms and hold each other’s hands to form a support for another person—Scotland and northern England, 19th century