Directory
Word origin cards
Browse by word, theme, source language, or the story you half-remember.
Algorithm
A person became a process, then a word for rules machines follow.
Science & MathLatinSalary
The word still carries the old link between pay, provisions, and survival.
MoneyOld FrenchMortgage
A cheerful modern word with a very medieval little shadow.
MoneyCzechRobot
Before robots were gadgets, they were a labor anxiety.
TechnologyItalianQuarantine
A public-health rule became a permanent word for waiting apart.
HealthNahuatlAvocado
A common grocery word with a pre-Columbian root system.
FoodArabicCoffee
A word that traveled almost as well as the habit did.
FoodSanskritOrange
The fruit named the color in English, not the other way around.
FoodPersian / ArabicCheckmate
A board-game ending became a general word for being trapped.
GamesGreekPanic
A feeling named after a god who could make the landscape feel alive.
EmotionOld English / Greek mythClue
A clue is still a thread that gets you out of a maze.
MysteryItalian / GreekDisaster
The word remembers when catastrophe had astrology in it.
RiskArabicHazard
Risk vocabulary grew out of dice before spreadsheets got involved.
RiskLatinMuscle
Anatomy can be stranger than metaphor.
BodyGreek coinageNostalgia
Homesickness became an aesthetic.
EmotionGreekSarcasm
The old root is more violent than the modern eye roll.
LanguageLatinCompanion
Friendship, at root, is lunch.
RelationshipsGreekSchool
School started as the opposite of being too busy.
LearningOld NorseWindow
The house has an eye where the wind looks in.
HomeLatin / ItalianUmbrella
Before it was rain gear, it was portable shade.
ObjectsHindiShampoo
The bottle word began as an action.
BodyGaelicWhiskey
A poetic name survived inside a bar order.
FoodArabicMagazine
A publication began as a warehouse.
MediaAmerican EnglishDeadline
The office word used to be a literal line.
WorkLatinCandidate
Campaign branding started with wardrobe.
PoliticsOld French / LatinVillain
Class contempt hardened into moral vocabulary.
StatusLatinNice
One of English's great reputation makeovers.
PersonalityLatinSincere
A good word for showing why origin stories need caution.
PersonalityLatinData
The modern internet runs on things given, collected, and reinterpreted.
TechnologyGreek coinageMeme
The word became an example of itself.
InternetLatinCamera
The phone camera still carries a room inside the word.
TechnologyItalianCasino
The word went from house to risk machine.
GamesArabic / SanskritZero
A nothing that changed everything.
Science & MathJapaneseTycoon
A political title became a business archetype.
Power