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Queens, queans & gynes

The word queen is distantly related to the first part of gynaecology and the second part of misogyny.

It’s also related to Norwegian kone (wife) and kvinne (woman), but they’re not full cognates.

While queen comes from Proto-Germanic *kwēniz (wife), kone and kvinne stem from *kwenōn (woman). In English, this became the disparaging – and now archaic – word quean (slut).

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Unexpected cognates

The word town shares its origin with German Zaun (‘fence’) and Dutch tuin (‘garden’), even though their forms and meanings are quite different. They all stem form Proto-Germanic *tūnan, whose meaning is reconstructed as ‘fenced area’. Over the course of 2000 years, they’ve grown apart.

My new graphic shows nine unexpected but true cognates in English, German, Dutch, Frisian, and Swedish.

In the article on my Patreon (850 words, tier 1), I explain how the meanings of these nine words group diverged over time.

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The seasons of Romance

The Spanish words primavera (spring) and verano (summer) both derive from Latin vēr (spring).

Originally, primavera was early spring, while verano was late spring.

However, their meanings shifted to later in the year, and estío, the original word for summer, was dethroned.

That’s not the only interesting story the Romance words for the seasons have to tell. Click my new infographic to learn all about the four seasons in the five largest Romance languages.

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Indo-European youth

The English word young has surprising cognates in other languages in its Indo-European family.

Irish óg and Welsh ifanc mean ‘young’ but don’t resemble young at all, while Italian giovenco means ‘young bull’.

More distantly, young is related to youth, juvenile, junior, Spanish joven, French jeune, and more.

Click my new graphic to discover more about this word family.

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East & west

The French words est and ouest look a lot like English east and west.

That’s because they were borrowed from Old English, along with other nautical terms, which points to naval contacts. French then passed on est and ouest, as well as nord and sud, to the other Romance languages.

My new graphic tells you how we know Old English was the donor language, how east is related to aurora, and why west may have orignally meant ‘where the sun sets’.

If you’re looking for the stories of north and south, please see Friday’s post.

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North & south

The French words nord and sud look a lot like English north and south.

That’s not a coincidence: it’s because Old French borrowed these words from Old English norþ and sūþ – along with est and ouest, which come from ēast and west. The other Romance languages later adopted these words from French.

My new infographic tells you all about the fascinating theories about the history of north, south and their cognates.

Next time: east and west.

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A quick bio of vital words

The word quick has many surprising relatives.

It’s related to vital, vivid, and Spanish vivir (to live) via Latin, and to bio- and zoo via Ancient Greek.

Germanic relatives include Dutch kweken (to grow; to foster) and German keck (sassy).

Zoom in on my new infographic to learn how these words are related:

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Chez casa mia

Chez moi is the French way of saying ‘at my place’. The preposition chez has a fascinating origin: it comes from the same word as Spanish casa (‘house’): Latin casa.

Casa originally meant ‘hut’, but it was destined for a great future: it would become the common word for ‘house’ in almost all Romance languages.

What was the original Latin word for ‘house’ and what happened to it? And where does the current French word maison come from? My new infographic tells you all about it and shows a wide selection of Romance descendants of Latin casa.