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Words and their Origins
Etymology is the study of the history of words - where these
words originate from and how their meanings have changed over
time. Here's a few interesting ones to get you started.
Ketchup
Before there was ever tomato ketchup, there were fish sauces in
eastern Asia. These fish sauces had a ketchup-like consistency.
They still sell them in grocery stores today.
The word "ketchup" comes from the
Malay/Indonesian word "kecap", or spelled
"ketcap" by the Dutch. This word can be further derived from the
Chinese ke'tsiap 茄汁. English and Dutch sailors
brought the Asian styled ketchup to Europe, where many flavorings
such as mushrooms, achovies and nuts were added to the basic fish
sauce.
In Cantonese Chinese, "ket" means tomato and "chup" means sauce.
Combined, it means tomato sauce - which is today's ketchup as we
know it.
Utopia
The word "utopia" is today defined as an ideal society or perfect
place. It was taken from the a book titled Utopia by
Thomas More in 1516, describing a fictional island with a perfect
society.
"Utopia" is ancient Greek in origin and means
"Not" + "Place"; in other words, "nowhere". This would suggest
that More's book on a perfect society was not possible anywhere.
Orangutan
The orangutan is an animal you've probably seen at the zoo
before. Orangutan is derived from the Malay and
Indonesian words orang meaning "person" and
hutan meaning "forest". So, orangutan means "person of
the forest".
Juggernaut
A juggernaut is a term used to describe an unstoppable force,
something that crushes everything in its path.
This word comes from the Sanskrit word
"Jagannātha", meaning "Lord of the universe". This is one of the
many names of Krisha from the ancient Vedic scripts of India.
The famous Jagannath Temple in Puri, India, has an annual chariot
procession called Ratha Yatra, which carries the statues of
Jagannâth / Krishna. This massive, multi-ton chariot is so
enormous in rare instance it has slipped out of control and has
caused injury. This led British colonialists to contrive the word
"Juggernaut" to refer to unstoppable, crushing forces.
Salary
The ancient Roman word salarium has
developed into today's word salary, which is the money we earn
from employment. The Roman historian Pliny the Elder stated that
soldiers in Rome were originally payed in salt. The Latin word
for salt is sal.
Robot
Comes from the Czech word robota,
meaning "forced labour" or "hard work". It comes from a play by
Czech writer Karl Čapek. This play was performed in 1921 and was
entitled R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots), where
machines take over and turn humans into robotic slaves.
Assassin
The word assassin comes from Hashshashin, an army of
trained killers who employed by the Muslims during the Crusades.
This society killed members of the Abbasid and Seljuq élite for
political and religious reasons. It was thought that these
hashashin would smoke hashish, also known as cannabis, so they
would be under the influence of drugs when they went out to
kill.
Some Islamic scholars now think this unlikely, and favour the
etymology of assassiyun, meaning people who were faithful to the
foundation (assass) of the Muslim faith.
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