Subscribe to Blog via Email
Join 329 other subscribersDecember 2025 M T W T F S S 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31
Category: Linguistics
Why is the letter x doubled in neologisms such as doxxing and anti-vaxxers?
Speculation, but I’m assuming there’s a direct line from haxxor to doxx(er) to vaxxer. Leetspeak, the affective use of creating spellings in hacker communities, has taken up the use of -xxor or -xx0r as a creative spelling of –cker; thus, haxxor for hacker. haxxor – Wiktionary. The duplication of <x> is an affectation. In fact […]
What are all the Greek star names?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Arabic_star_names Drawing on: History of Constellation and Star Names In Greek astronomy the stars within the constellation figures were usually not given individual names. (There are only a few individual star names from Greece. The most prominent stars in the sky were usually nameless in Greek civilization. If there was a system of Greek star […]
Could someone tell of “owt” or “nowt” regarding Yorkshire?
Well, this is what the Googles gets me (with a peek at the OED): http://www.yorkshiredialect.com/… Owt and Nowt are shibboleths for Yorkshire: they are very common dialect words. The historical pronunciation seems to be something like /ou/. They are indeed derived from aught and naught; the spelling with an au is from Early Modern Southern […]
Technically speaking, is Doggo a pidgin language?
Hate to bring the serious to the answer, but I’m with Jiim Klein: Pidgins are called that because of their origins, rather than their grammar, although they do tend to be remarkably similar. “Foreigner talk”, the way people dumb down language when talking to non-fluent speakers, are informally called pidgins, and indeed foreigner talk is […]
What is the Greek equivalent of “Skin in the Game”?
Tough one, I agree. And it turns out OP was after Ancient Greek. For Modern Greek, I agree with Yiannis Papadopoulos’ answer to What is the Greek equivalent of “Skin in the Game”? that “skin in the game” is about emotional investment, not “putting your ass on the line”. It’s easier for me to actually […]
What language games do linguists play?
More of a polyglot game, this, than a linguist game, but: switch the TV to a foreign language film halfway through, and try to work out what the language is. The fact that the language almost always sustains a local film industry does constrain the possible choices. The rule of thumb I worked out quite […]
Who has invented the word philosophia?
The word is all over the place in Plato and his contemporaries and it’s not in Homer. Philosophy – Wikipedia guesses that Pythagoras probably came up with it first. The basis for that guess, from what I can tell, is that as cited in LSJ (s.v. φιλόσοφος), both Cicero (Tusc. 5.3.9) and Diogenes Laertes (prooem […]
Who invented the word “Mathematics”?
In its modern meaning of mathematics, the earliest citation Liddell–Scott give is the treatise of the same name by Archytas. (However, the German Wikipedia doubts that was the original title of his work.) The term comes into its own in its modern meaning in Aristotle, a generation later, who uses it extensively. Plato was the […]
In Ancient Greek, how common is this declension? It’s in the second declension group but called “attic declension.”
To add to the others: Vote #1: Humphry Smith’s answer to In Ancient Greek, how common is this declension? It’s in the second declension group but called “attic declension.” Vote #1: Robert Todd’s answer to In Ancient Greek, how common is this declension? It’s in the second declension group but called “attic declension.” The Attic […]
Do “lëkurë” and “leder” have any link with each other?
The Albanian lëkurë means ‘skin, bark’. The German Leder means ‘leather’. Consulting Vladimir Orel’s Albanian Etymological Dictionary: lëkurë ‘skin, bark’ < *lauk-urā lakur ‘naked’ < *lauk-ura In both cases, *lauk– is derived from Indo-European *leuk̂- ‘to shine, to be white’. German Leder, English leather < Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/leþrą < Proto-Indo-European *létrom ‘leather’. From The Oxford Introduction to […]