Word of the Week

The start of Advent seems like a great time to look at the history of a word that reminds Christians of Christ--our Lord and...you guessed it...KING! King is obviously a word that's been around forever and hasn't varied much in meaning. But have you ever wondered...

We've all been there. We've had a bad day, something went wrong, someone hurt our feelings, or maybe we're just not feeling well physically--times when the best word we can find to describe our state is upset. We all know what we mean--that nothing's quite right, that...

The day, my husband and I were walking and talking about a potential building project, and he said something about all the work that needs to go into a foundation, water lines, electric, etc--that "groundwork accounts for half the work." He then mused as to whether...

Last week we were chatting about the style of certain classmates from college, and a friend said, "I bet he wears seersucker suits, doesn't he?" In fact, he does. 😉 But it made me curious about the word. We've likely all seen that iconic striped fabric...but did you...

If you've studied plot structure at all, you may have come across the word denouement. It's that wrapping-up part of a story that happens after the climax, sometimes called the resolution. We've been using this word in English since the 1750s, borrowed directly (of...

As a historical writer, I've used the word betrothal plenty of times, since it was more common than engagement throughout much of history. But I've never actually paused to look up the root of the word! It makes total sense though, as I'm sure you'll agree. Betrothal...

I admit it--I'm a little bit obsessed with anything that belongs on a desk. Notebooks, pens, journals, even paperclips and staplers make me grin. When I walk into an office supply store, it takes great restraint to look only for what I need and not every pretty shade...

Original post published October 23, 2017 Saturday as the kids and I were driving Rowyn to a birthday party, they were observing that it was way too warm for fall, and all the trees were still green . . . and Xoë then said, “I don’t like that we call it fall. It should...

Legend. We all know what the word means...and my character Bram spends a lot of time in Worthy of Legend pondering what really makes someone worthy to be called a hero, worthy to have stories written and sung and remembered about him or her. But have you ever paused...

Today is Labor Day in the US, which is the unofficial start of autumn. Specifically, it marks the beginning of a new school year for American kids (many of whom have already been back to school for a couple weeks). What better time to examine the history of the word?...

Sometimes it's fun to look up words so very common that one never really pauses to think about them. You never know what you're going to find! So as one of my cats stared at me as I was contemplating this week's Word of the Week, I chuckled and said, "Okay, sure, why...

As of the moment when I'm writing this, we're awaiting a few fun deliveries at our house--a new bed frame and desk for Rowyn, who has been asking for about a year to update his room. We decided that starting high school was a pretty good time to get rid of the...

Anyone who has read The Odyssey has "met" the original Sirens ... the mythological creatures in Greek history who lure sailors to their destruction on rocks with their sweet singing. But I daresay most of us haven't looked too closely at the word. The Greek seirenes...

I learned way back in my school days that two of our summer months are named for Roman emperors--July (for Julius Caesar) and August (for Augustus Caesar). I imagine you knew that too. Similarly, you probably know that august as an adjective means "solemnly grand,...

A week or two ago, that familiar chime of "Word of the Week!" sang out through the house. I looked up--ever eager for a new word to add to the list--and said, "Oo! What?" My husband replied with, "Cult and culture. They're clearly related, but I'd never stopped to...

Revisiting this delicious word today. Originally published August 27, 2018. The heat of summer is fully upon us, and we all know nothing tastes as good on those hot summer days as cool treats. Ice cream, Popsicles, frozen coffees and yogurts and you-name-it. My...

Cappuccino. The mere word conjures up images of beautiful coffee, and the mere thought gets my tastebuds dancing. I am a coffee lover, so all kinds of coffee earn this reaction. Latte, mocha...mmm. Yep. I've always loved cappuccinos too, since I was a kid, even before...

Do you know where the word trivia comes from? If not, it's definitely a fun bit of trivia that you'll want to know! (LOL--couldn't resist!) The official meaning of trivia is "bits of information of little consequence." It became a common word in 1932 but has been...

Happy Independence Day, to all my American readers! I hope everyone has a day of fun planned. =) In honor of the day, I thought I'd revisit a Word of the Week post that I first published in 2015...but I had totally forgotten ever looking this one up, so I figure some...

Inspire. We all know what it means, and we all love things that do it, right? Things that fill the heart and mind...things that prompt us to do something. The word has been around in English since the mid-1300s, and it came to us via the French enspirer, which in turn...

Introduction My WORD OF THE WEEK posts have been bringing you word histories and etymologies for well over a decade. I always love it when a reader sends me a note asking me to look into a new word that they'd been wondering about. In my house, we've all trained...

Here on the blog, we examine a lot of word histories and etymologies. But have you ever paused to wonder about the letters that make them up? One reader asked me to look into the history of the alphabet itself...which is quite a thing! Of course, I figured the place...

Radical. Generally, when we hear this word today, it's being used to describe political or other views and positions. It means, in that sense, "extreme." And because it's used like that so often, we tend to think of it that way still when we hear phrases like "radical...

Fire. This one ranks as a word used often and well known. So why, you wonder, would I look into the etymology and history? Largely because there are so many interesting ways to use it, both as a noun, and a verb, that have cropped up over the years! I thought today...

During our Greek time a little while ago, my daughter and I translated a passage in Matthew that involved the word "tree." Or, as it would sound in Greek, dendron. Of course, as we're reading these words out loud, one of our primary interests--being word nerds as we...

Have you ever wondered about the meaning of tongue-in-cheek ... and perhaps where this bizarre phrase came from? Well, it dates from 1856 in that hyphenated version, taken from the less-succinct phrase "to speak with one's tongue in one's cheek," which comes from...

A couple weeks ago, I had a message from a reader asking me to do a feature on arctic and antarctic, because he heard they meant "near the bear" and "away from the bear" and thought, "Nah, that can't be right!" I love that I'm the word nerd that people turn to for...

You probably know the definition of tedious: "tiresome because of length or dullness : boring." But the etymology of tedious is actually a bit more interesting and made me snort-laugh when I saw it. Tedious and tedium are from the Late Latin taediosus and taedium...

Last week I took a look at the uses of second ... which led me straight to minute. I did mention in that post that the divisions of time were once "prime minute" and "second minute" ... well, along the way, "prime minute" got shortened to minute and "second minute" to...

The other day as my daughter and I were watching her pre-cal lesson, the presenter (talking about the velocity of falling objects) said, "Now, in the second second, the object will be moving at..." Xoe looked over at me and said, "Why is it called that, anyway? Why is...

We all know what reveal and revelation mean, of course...and they have been in the English language for a LONG time. Like, since the early 1400s. The meaning has never really changed either--it's always been "to disclose, to divulge, to make known." What's interesting...

Today's word comes courtesy of the reading my daughter and I have been doing in our Greek New Testament. We came across the word for treasure (thesauros), we both went, "Hey! That sounds like 'thesaurus'!" To which I of course said, "Well, maybe we use it as 'a...

Stoic. You probably know what it means: "a person who accepts what happens without complaint or showing emotion." I was in college when I learned that this was referring to a particular group of people who adhered to the philosophy of Zeno and then Epictetus, ancient...

My daughter and I have been reading a verse from Matthew in Greek each day and then looking at the translation (after she does actual translation in her Ancient Greek textbook), just to see the language in actual use. Well, when one starts in Matthew, that means one...

Swear is one of those words that comes to us alllll the way from Old English. In its original (and still a surviving) meaning, it's simply "to take an oath." You may wonder, then, why it's sometimes associated with "use bad language"? I know I have! That meaning is...

When you look up mission in the dictionary, there are a LOT of definitions listed. A task a group is charged with. A calling or vocation. A group of people organized to carry out a certain task. A ministry. Then, in entry 5, you get the obsolete one: "the act of...

I've shared the etymology of holiday before, back in 2011, but I figured ten years is enough time that I can revisit. 😉 I always find this one kind of funny...at least when people object to people saying "Happy Holidays!" instead of "Merry Christmas." My opinion has...

Decadent. I don't know about you, but when I hear that word, I think of ooey-gooey chocolate ... maybe caramel ... something rich and satisfying and the highest heights of delightful. Turns out, I'm a victim of a 1970s-and-onward advertising hijack of the word....

Last week I took a look at the etymology of the word author (which you'd have thought I'd looked up long ago, right??), and I mentioned its interesting connection to the word authority...which is, of course, what we're looking at today! To be honest, I assumed that...

I can't believe I've never looked this one up before, but...clearly I hadn't, LOL. Because I was completely surprised to learn that author did not originally mean "writer." Did you know that?? Author has been in use in English since the mid-1300s, taken from the Latin...

Anyone else like to watch Forged in Fire? If you're unfamiliar with it, it's a competition show where smiths are forging knives. So fascinating! Watching that show has taught me that one of the most important things for steel is that it's well tempered....

We recently celebrated my daughter's 16th birthday, and one of her requests was to get her ears pierced. I got mine done when I was five, but I actually stopped wearing earrings after high school and just never picked the habit back up...so I thought, "Oh, I'll go...

This one comes a special request from a regular reader (Hi, Bev!), who was wondering about the phrase "doggie bag." It's pretty straightforward, really, but interesting nonetheless! The phrase is first recorded in the 1960s, for a take-home container of leftovers from...