Okay, I’m a little late in the season for this one, I grant you…but the question came up when my daughter received her high school diploma, and I haven’t honestly done any of these posts since then–June was CRAZY! And I figure, hey, learning is learning. 😉
So the word diploma comes (not surprisingly) from Latin. The Latin word being–brace yourself–diploma. Yep. Straight borrow there. The interesting thing, though, comes in the meaning. The Latin, and the original English that dates from the 1640s, both meant “an official state letter of recommendation.” This would be less like our diplomas today and more like what became a passport or a letter of introduction. The Latin is actually taken straight from the Greek, from the words “fold over.” So not a rolled scroll or something in a frame–a folded piece of paper.
By 1680, it was being used in relation to documents issues by colleges to award achievements. This is of course our primary meaning today–and it’s extended to other schools as well–but it wasn’t exclusively that kind of document until modern times.
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Roseanna M. White is a bestselling, Christy Award winning author who has long claimed that words are the air she breathes. When not writing fiction, she’s homeschooling her two kids, editing, designing book covers, and pretending her house will clean itself. Roseanna is the author of a slew of historical novels that span several continents and thousands of years. Spies and war and mayhem always seem to find their way into her books…to offset her real life, which is blessedly ordinary.
I’m curious about the origins of the word glare, and why it refers to a facial expression and bright reflected light…?
I see diplomas from all over the world in the course of my job, and it’s interesting to me how many languages, even some without Latin roots, have adopted a version of the word diploma: diplôme, diplom, diplomi, etc.