Recently I read something or other which featured the word quintessential, and was struck by that prefix. Quint-, as in five. The word doesn’t seem to have an obvious link to the number, so I went looking for more information. Continue reading
medieval
Ye Olde Thorn in My Side
Ye Olde English
How do you pronounce that phrase? Some people might argue about whether the e in Olde should be pronounced, but no-one would dispute how to pronounce the other two words. Would they…?
It seems reasonable to assume (as I did for a long time) that Ye is pronounced with a y sound (as in you) at the beginning of the word, but here’s the thing:
That’s not a y. Continue reading
Chicken – The People’s Food
Cow – Beef
Calf – Veal
Pig – Pork
Deer – Venison
Sheep – Mutton
Chicken – Chicken
Not hard to spot the odd one out, eh? Forgetting about chicken for a moment, have you ever noticed that in English, we have special names for the most-commonly consumed meats, separate from the names of the animals themselves? Continue reading
Trust Me, I’m a Doctor
—Is there a doctor on the plane!?
—Yes, I’m a doctor!
—Oh thank God, come quick, I think he’s having a heart attack!
—Oh, I’m not a medical doctor. I have a PhD in medieval French literature. It’s quite interesting actually. You see…
Why do we use doctor in two such different ways in English? What’s the link between a physician and a top-level academic? Looking at the origin of the word, it comes from the Medieval Latin doctor meaning religious adviser, teacher, or scholar. You can still observe that meaning in modern words such as doctrine or indoctrination. Towards the end of the 16th century, doctor began to replace the much older word leech, meaning physician. Continue reading
English-Language Thoughts 