Pepsi

→ French: pepsi

→ Hindi: पेप्सी (pepsī)

→ Mauritian Creole: pepsi

→ Polish: pepsi

→ Portuguese: Pepsi, pepsi

→ Serbo-Croatian: Pepsi, pepsi

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-Pepsi.wav

Originally short for Pepsi-Cola, coined in 1898 as a renaming of the brand from "Brad's Drink", in order to imply that the fizzy drink could cure dyspepsia. While some have suggested Pepsi is short for the digestive enzyme pepsin, sometimes with the assumption that pepsin was used as an ingredient in Pepsi, this is a folk etymology, as there is no official confirmation of it nor any evidence for a link between the enzyme and the beverage.
Nonetheless, both the words pepsin and dyspepsia ultimately derive from Ancient Greek πέψις (pépsis), which means “cooking, fermentation or digestion”. (Compare Italian pepsi, from the same source.)
(person from Quebec): In reference to their supposed love of junk food.

[…] and to maintain a relatively superior, paternalistic position from which French Canadians are for the most part regarded as 'peasoups' or 'Pepsis,' as fellow citizens requiring benevolent supervision […]

1993, Canadian Review of Comparative Literature, volume 20, page 276:

(slang, ethnic slur) A person from Quebec, Canada.


Jesus

head

Jesus (plural (of male given name) Jesuses or Jesi)

Jesuses (plural)
Jesi (plural)
Iesus (alternative)
Iesvs (alternative)
Jesu (alternative)
Jeezus (alternative)

/ˈd͡ʒiːˌzʌs/

From Middle English Jhesus, Iesus, from Latin Iēsūs, from Ancient Greek Ἰησοῦς (Iēsoûs), from Biblical Hebrew יֵשׁוּעַ (yēšū́aʿ), a contracted form of יְהוֹשֻׁעַ (yəhōšúaʿ, “Joshua”). The form יֵשׁוּעַ (yēšū́aʿ) is attested in some of the later books of the Hebrew Bible (Ezra–Nehemiah), and translated as Jeshua or Yeshua in some English editions (the former appearing in the King James Version). The Greek texts make no distinction between Jesus and Joshua, referring to them both as Ἰησοῦς (Iēsoûs). In the Wycliffe Bible (Middle English), the forms used are Jhesus and Jhesu.

Sister of the Holy Names of Jesus and Mary

Frensham opened the door and called a name that sounded like 'Haysus'. Brandy was brought and various other bottles and decanters. When the manservant had gone, Frensham said, 'Odd, aren't they, the Spanish? Calling a boy Jesus.'

1971, Ruth Rendell, No More Dying Then, Random House, published 2009, →ISBN, page 195:

A male given name from Spanish in Spanish culture; an anglicized spelling of Jesús.

Jesus son of Sirach wrote the "Wisdom of Sirach"


Marshallese

From Marshall (“Marshall Islands”) + -ese.

The Austronesian language of the Marshall Islands.


Meryam Mir

Meriam (alternative)
Miriam (alternative)

Torres Strait Islands
Torres Strait Islands

The Trans-Fly Papuan language spoken in the eastern Torres Strait Islands.


Kala Lagaw Ya

The Pama-Nyungan language spoken in the western Torres Strait Islands.


Torres Strait Creole

/ˈtɔːɹɛz stɹeɪt ˈkɹiːəʊl/

From Torres Strait + Creole (“language formed from two parent languages”).

af

A creole spoken in the Torres Strait Islands.


Kriol

A creole language widely spoken by Australian Aborigines in Arnhem Land; Roper River creole; Australian Kriol.


Bube

A Bantu language spoken by the Bubi people.


Assamese

The Indo-Aryan language spoken by the majority people in the state of Assam, NE India.


Bengali

en-noun

Bengali (countable and uncountable, plural Bengalis)

Bengalis (plural)
Bangalee (alternative)
Bengalee (alternative)
Bangali (alternative)

Equivalent to Bengal + -i. Compare Assamese বঙালী (boṅali), Bengali বাঙ্গালী (baṅgali), Hindi बंगाली (baṅgālī), Classical Persian بنگالی (bangālī).

(uncountable) A language spoken in Bangladesh and the states of Assam, Tripura and West Bengal, India.

बंगाली भाषा

baṅgālī bhāṣā

बाङ्गला भाषा

bāṅgalā bhāṣā


Bicol

From Spanish Bicol / Vicol (“former province, river (Bicol River), language”), from Bikol Central, see Bikol Central Bicol for more.

The language of the native inhabitants of the region, Bicolano.


Cebuano

/sɛˈbwɑːnəʊ/

From Spanish cebuano, from Cebú (“Cebu”) + -ano (“-an”).

A language spoken in the Philippines in and near the province of Cebu.


Chickasaw

Some place names in the United States:
A city in Mobile County, Alabama.


Gujarati

/ˌɡʊd͡ʒəˈrɑːti/

/ˌɡuːd͡ʒəˈrɑːti/

Borrowed from Gujarati ગુજરાતી (gujrātī).

Gujerati (alternative)
Gujrati (alternative)
Goojratee (alternative)
Gujratee (alternative)
Guzarati (alternative)
Guzerati (alternative)

The Indic language spoken in the state of Gujarat, India


Hopi

From Hopi hopi (“Hopi, good in every respect, be wise/knowing”) (as in Hopituu sinom "Hopi people"). Popularized by J. Walter Fewkes as a replacement for the previously used and offensive name Moqui which sounds like Hopi mooki "dies, be dead".

der

A member of a particular tribe of North American natives.


Hopi

The Uto-Aztecan language spoken by this North American tribe.


Hopi

A Coal Mine capable of producing 450,000 tons of coal annually started operation in Hopi, Honan.

1960 September, “1957 April-December”, in E. Stuart Kirby, editor, Contemporary China, volume III, →OCLC, page 278:

Two other major coal-mining centers, each producing coking-grade bituminous coal, have been developed in Honan since the late 1950's. Hopi, in northernmost Honan, arose in 1957 on the site of a small, primitive operation in a deposit of lean coal, low in volatile content. A city was established in that year, and the mining complex was linked by a 12-mile rail spur with Tangyin, on the main Peking-Hankow line.

1972, Theodore Shabad, “The North China Plain”, in China's Changing Map, New York: Frederick A. Praeger, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 119:

Death certificates were tabulated to map morality from esophageal cancer in the 181 counties and cities of the survey. The counties with the highest incidences were Yangcheng and Hopi with rates, respectively, of 135 and 140 per 100,000. By contrast, in Hunyuan County the rate was under 2 per 100,000.

1975 June 17, Walter Sullivan, “CHINA STUDY LINKS CANCER TO REGION”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-10-05, page 66:


Luo

The Nilotic language spoken by this group, also known as Dholuo.


Malayalam

From Malayalam മലയാളം (malayāḷaṁ), from മല (mala, “hill, mountain”) + അളം (aḷaṁ, “place”).

Padmanabhan uttered a command in Malayalam, the regional language.

2012 April 30, Jake Halpern, “The Secret of the Temple”, in The New Yorker:

A Dravidian language spoken in the states of Kerala and Lakshadweep, India.


Marathi

From Marathi मराठी (marāṭhī). Doublet of Maharashtri.

I made a pact with her that she would teach me more Marathi and I could teach her the English alphabet.

2020, Avni Doshi, Burnt Sugar, Hamish Hamilton, page 110:

An Indo-Aryan language that is the predominant language spoken in the state of Maharashtra, India.


Mohawk

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-Mohawk.wav

From Dutch Mohawk.
An exonym, probably from Narragansett Mohowaúgsuck, Mauquàuog, meaning “they eat (animate things)”, “cannibals”. The phoneme /m/ is not present in the Mohawk language; the Mohawk autonym is Kanien'kehá:ka (Kanienkehaka, Kanyenkehaka).

The Iroquoian language spoken by these North American indigenous people.


Quechua

Spanish, from Quechua qhichwa (literally “temperate valley”).

uder

The Quechuas, a tribe of the Inca people, were Indians of the red race and with an appearance and trait which is distinctly American. “They are”, says Victor W. Von Hagen in his book, Realm of the Incas, “of medium height, and inclined to be thickset, with large hands, small wrists, a disproportionately large chest (developed for breathing at high altitudes), well-developed legs, and wide-spreading feet. They are broad-headed, with high cheekbones, prominent aquiline noses, and small, almond-shaped eyes.” There are still five million of them in the Andes.

1972, Lytle Robinson, chapter 5, in Edgar Cayceʼs Story of the Origin and Destiny of Man, USA: Berkley Publishing Corporation, page 105:

A member of one of several South American ethnic groups that spans Peru, Bolivia, northwestern Argentina, northern Chile, and in Ecuador and southern Colombia.


Quenya

From Noldorin Quenya Quenya, ultimately derived from the Primitive Quendian root *kwene ("person"), being the name for the language invented by J. R. R. Tolkien as the language spoken by the Elves in his books.

constructed language
constructed language

A constructed language created by J. R. R. Tolkien modelled on Greek, Latin and Finnish.


Shona

Scottish Anglicized form of Seonag ( =Joan) and an American variant of Shauna.

A female given name from Scottish Gaelic.


Sinhalese

en-noun

Sinhalese (countable and uncountable, plural Sinhalese)

Sinhalese (plural)
Singalese (alternative)
Singhalese (alternative)
Cinghalese (alternative)
Cingalese (alternative)

(uncountable) The Indo-Aryan language of the Sinhalese people.


Sioux

From French Sioux, shortening of Nadouessioux, from Ojibwe naadawesiwag (“little snakes”), which could refer to the massasauga snake (Sistrurus catenatus), a small rattlesnake.

Various formerly nomadic Native American tribes of the North American Great Plains.


Tamil

Tamil (countable and uncountable, plural Tamils)

Borrowed from Tamil தமிழ் (tamiḻ, “Tamil”); see that entry for theories.

(uncountable) A Dravidian language spoken in the state of Tamil Nadu, India and in Sri Lanka, Singapore, Malaysia.


Urdu

Borrowed from Hindustani (see Urdu اُرْدُو (urdū) and Hindi उर्दू (urdū)), from Classical Persian اُرْدُو (urdū), from Proto-Turkic *ordu (“army, camp”) ( > Azerbaijani ordu, Turkish ordu, Turkmen oorda). Doublet of horde and orda.

‘Urdu was born in the barracks a few hundred years ago, and was spoken by soldiers. It gets its grammar from Hindi, and vocabulary from Persian.’

2023, Santanu Bhattacharya, One Small Voice, Fig Tree, page 78:

Modern Standard Urdu, an Indo-Aryan language with native speakers mainly in Pakistan and North India. It is a standardized and Persianized version of Hindustani.


Sinhala

Borrowed from Sinhalese සිංහල (siṁhala), itself borrowed from Sanskrit सिंहल (siṃhala, literally “lionlike”), from सिंह (siṃhá, “lion”) + -ल (-la), recorded as the name of the island of Ceylon (Sri Lanka) from about the 10th to 12th century, but presumably older, as it is also the source of the name Ceylon in western geographic tradition.
The name is sometimes glossed as "abode of lions", referring to a supposed former abundance of lions on the island ( The Asiatic Journal 20 (1836), p. 30). Doublet of Ceylon and Elu.


Sarah

en-proper noun

Sarah (countable and uncountable, plural Sarahs)

Sarahs (plural)
Sara (alternative)
Zara (alternative)
Zarah (alternative)

From Biblical Hebrew שָׂרָה (śārâ, “lady, princess”), from the Biblical figure originally named Sarai (שָׂרָי (śārāy, literally “masters, princes”)).

bor

I also have two daughters, by now grown up. Their names are Sarah and Anne, good sensible names. - - - I am a believer in sensible choices, so different from many of my own. Also in sensible names for children, because look what happened to Cordelia.

1988, Margaret Atwood, Cat's Eye, page 15:


Lyssa

It was mornings like this when Lyssa really appreciated the indoor arena.

2002, Karle Dickerson, Joanna Campbell, Hoofprints in the snow:

Anaisse sank down to the carpet in order to look her in her eye. She smiled. "My name is Anaisse. Where is your mother, Lyssa?"

2005, Anya Bast, Seasons of Pleasure: Summer and Autumn:

Lyssa, that's what I want to find out. Will you think about it?


ee

The word length, which contains only four sounds l e ng th, is usually spell'd thus, el ee en gee tee aitch.

1773 October, The Monthly Review Or Literary Journal Enlarged:

I have drunk en-ee-cee-tee-ay-ar from the ef-ell-oh-doubleyou-ee-ar-ess in his gee-ay-ar-dee-ee-en many a time.

2004, Will Rogers, The Stonking Steps, page 170:

ETA [is spoken] as "ee-tee-ay" instead of "I SPELL Echo Tango Alfa".

2016 CCEB, Communications Instructions Radiotelephone Procedures: ACP125 (G), p. 3-5

Alternative form of e: the name of the Latin-script letter E/e.


Venetia

A female given name from Latin used since the late Middle Ages.


Venus

From Middle English Venus, from Latin Venus.


Marcus

Borrowing of Latin Marcus. Doublet of Mark.

Aristarchus my fellow prisoner saluteth you, and Marcus sisters sonne to Barnabas, (touching whome yee receiued commandements; if he come vnto you, receiue him:) […]

1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Colossians 4:10:

The two Marci, Livius Denter, and Æmilius, ſucceeding to the conſulſhip, war broke out again with the Æquans; […]

1814, Titus Livius, translated by George Baker, The History of Rome, 2nd edition, volume II, London: […] T[homas] Cadell and W[illiam] Davies, […], page 323:

But, as the historian said, there were many Marci in one Cæsar, so there are many Cains and Judases in the best of us all.

1863, Samuel Trickett, edited by John Edward Blakeney, Sermons Doctrinal and Practical, London: […] G. Norman, […], page 224:

At epig. 73.5 the question ‘quis Marcus?’ is much more sensible, because there could have been many Marci to choose amongst.

2001, Nigel M. Kay, editor, Ausonius: Epigrams, Bloomsbury Academic, →ISBN, page 290:

But 'Marcus?' – a strangely Latinate name for someone born in Sighthill. ('Aspirational mother, boss,' he said. 'Better than Titus.Or Sextus.')

2008, Kate Atkinson, When Will There Be Good News, Doubleday, →ISBN, page 73:

Rubin wondered who Marcus was. It was a City name, but there were many Marcuses.

2016, Stella Gemmell, The Immortal Throne (The City; 2), Bantam Press, →ISBN:


Tzotzil

Tsotsil (alternative)
Tsotsile (alternative)
Tzotzile (alternative)
Zotzil (alternative)
Zotzile (alternative)


Khmer

From Khmer ខ្មែរ (khmae).
Attributed to the Pali term khemara (“one who is wholesome”). The elision form, ក្មេរ (kmera), is found in ancient stone inscriptions, or a borrowing from Northern Khmer เขมร (/khmɛːr/).

Despite my mother speaking Khmer to us at home, I hadn’t retained it through my formative years.

2024, Kaliane Bradley, The Ministry of Time, Sceptre, page 6:

The national language of Cambodia, part of the Mon-Khmer language family.

An abugida used to write the Khmer language and sometimes Pali.


Khmer

A member of an ethnolinguistic group that constitutes most of the population of Cambodia.


Khmer

en-adj

Khmer (comparative more Khmer, superlative most Khmer)

more Khmer (comparative)
most Khmer (superlative)

Of or pertaining to the Khmer people or their language.

خِمِيرِيّ

of or pertaining to the Khmer people or their language


Jim

Instead, they found the building locked and doors blocked by a plainclothes administrator named Jim Hairfield, who works in the agency’s security and facilities office, according to the education department website.

2025 February 7, Alex Baumhardt, “Oregon Rep. Bonamici among electeds inexplicably locked out of U.S. Education Department”, in Oregon Capital Chronicle:

A diminutive of the male given name James.


eth

The sound /ɛ/ followed by the sound of the letter, by analogy with other letter names, such as those of f, l, and m.

In Old English manuscripts thorn and eth did not have different phonetic values but were used positionally[.]

1985, Robert Burchfield, The English Language, Oxford: Oxford University Press, page 175:

A letter (capital Ð, small ð) introduced into Old English to represent its dental fricative, then not distinguished from the letter thorn, no longer used in English but still in modern use in Icelandic, the IPA and other phonetic alphabets to represent the voiced dental fricative "th" sound as in the English word then. The letter is also used in Faroese, but is generally silent in that language.


thorn

From Middle English thorn, þorn, from Old English þorn, from Proto-West Germanic *þorn, from Proto-Germanic *þurnaz, from Proto-Indo-European *tr̥nós, from *(s)ter- (“stiff”).
Cognates
Near cognates include West Frisian toarn, Low German Doorn, Dutch doorn, German Dorn, Danish and Norwegian torn, Swedish torn, törne, Gothic 𐌸𐌰𐌿𐍂𐌽𐌿𐍃 (þaurnus). Further cognates include Old Church Slavonic трънъ (trŭnŭ, “thorn”), Russian тёрн (tjorn), Polish cierń, Kamkata-viri taňi, tai (“thorn”), Sanskrit तृण (tṛ́ṇa, “grass”).

cog

See also Etymology of ye (definite article).

A letter of Latin script (capital: Þ, small: þ), borrowed from the futhark; today used only in Icelandic to represent the voiceless dental fricative, but originally used in several early Germanic scripts, including Old English where it represented the dental fricatives that are today written th (Old English did not have phonemic voicing distinctions for fricatives).


Magyar

From Hungarian magyar, from Proto-Ugric *mańćɜ (“man, person”).


Magyar

A Hungarian individual, especially in the sense of an ethnic Hungarian.


Novial

From Novial Nov International Auxiliari Lingue (“New International Auxiliary Language”).

uder

international auxiliary language
international auxiliary language

An international auxiliary language, or interlanguage, published by the Danish linguist Otto Jespersen in 1928.


jy

jies (plural)
jyes (plural)
jys (plural)

From the name of the letter i (of which j was originally a variant) by affixing the /d͡ʒ/ sound to it. Compare French ji, and the similar derivation of Italian vu.
Generally changed to jay by association with kay.

(archaic or dialectal, Scotland) The name of the Latin-script letter J/j.


entity

From the Medieval Latin entitās, from ēns (“being”) (stem: ent-) + -tās (compare essentia), see there for more information.

Appendix:Roget MICRA thesaurus/Class I § 1. Existence

(science fiction) An alien lifeform that has no corporeal body.

生命體 /生命体

(science fiction) alien lifeform that has no corporeal body


Cherokee

/ˌt͡ʃɛ.ɹəˈkiː/

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-Cherokee.wav

Most likely from the Cherokee autonym ᏣᎳᎩ (tsalagi). Derivation from a Choctaw exonym meaning "those who live in caves" (compare chiluk (“cave”)) has also been suggested — the Iroquois term for the Cherokee was Oyata'ge'ronon (“inhabitants of the cave country”) — as has derivation from a Creek term for "person(s) who speak(s) a non-Creek language" (see celokketv (“to speak a non-creek language”)).
Whatever its origin, the ethnonym entered European languages at an early date, perhaps as early as the 1670s; in Spanish, the people are called the Tchalaquei as early as 1755.

An unincorporated community in San Saba County, Texas.


schwa

Borrowed from German Schwa, from Hebrew שווא / שְׁוָא (shva, šəwā, “(mark mostly indicating absence of a vowel sound)”), borrowed from Classical Syriac ܫ̈ܘܰܝܳܐ (š'wayyā, literally “even, equal”), in Syriac a term for a sign consisting of two vertical dots used to separate parts of a sentence. Doublet of shva.

der

The participle has also, owing to the accent, the lightest possible forms; but here there was no reduplication, and so in class I. the "schwa" took the form e before single mutes or fricatives, and elsewhere o.

1882, B. W. Wells, “The Ablaut in English”, in Transactions of the American Philological Association, page 67:

However, word-final unstressed schwa is deleted even by the speakers from South Albania, though to different degrees and dependant on the speech style[…]

2006 April 27, Sylvia Moosmüller, Theodor Granser, “The spread of Standard Albanian: An illustration based on an analysis of vowels”, in Language Variation and Change, volume 18, number 2, Cambridge University Press, →DOI:

(phonetics) An indeterminate central vowel sound as the "a" in "about", represented as /ə/ in IPA.


schwa

en-verb

schwa (third-person singular simple present schwas, present participle schwaing, simple past and past participle schwaed)

schwas (present singular third-person)
schwaing (participle present)
schwaed (participle past)
schwaed (past)
shwa (alternative)

(phonetics, of a vowel sound, rare) To be reduced to schwa.


wynn

wynns (plural)
wen (alternative)
win (alternative)

From Middle English wynne, winne, wenne, wunne, wyn, from Old English wynn (“joy, pleasure”), from Proto-West Germanic *wunnju, from Proto-Germanic *wunjō, from Proto-Indo-European *wn̥h₁yeh₂, from *wenh₁- (“desire, wish, love”).

The Norman scribes gradually replaced wynn by u, uu, vv, and w itself.

A letter of the Old English alphabet, ƿ, borrowed from the futhark and used to represent the sound of w; replaced in Middle English times by the digraph uu, which later developed into the letter w.


yogh

yoghs (plural)
ȝogh (alternative)
ȝok (alternative)
yok (alternative)
ȝ (alternative)

From Middle English ȝogh, ȝ, of unknown origin. Several etymologies have been advanced, such as derivation from Middle English yok (“yoke”) or Old English ēoh (“rune ᛇ”), but all pose serious phonological problems.

A letter of the Middle English alphabet (capital Ȝ, small ȝ), in form derived from the Old English shape of the letter g, and used to represent various palatal and velar sounds.


frog

From frog legs, stereotypical food of the French. Compare Kraut (“German person”) and French rosbif (“English person”) (from roast beef), with similar food etymologies.

(Canada, offensive) A French-speaking person from Quebec.


ping pong

en-noun

ping pong (countable and uncountable, plural ping pongs)

ping pongs (plural)
ping-pong (alternative)
pingpong (alternative)

→ Chinese: 乒乓球 (pīngpāngqiú)

→ Greek: πινγκ πονγκ (pingk pongk)

→ Italian: ping pong

→ Japanese: ピンポン (pin pon)

→ Korean: 핑퐁 (pingpong)

→ Portuguese: pingue-pongue

→ Russian: пинг-понг (ping-pong)

→ Spanish: ping pong

Onomatopoeic. The name “ping-pong” was in wide use before British manufacturer J. Jaques & Son Ltd trademarked it in 1901. Jaques sold the rights to the “ping-pong” name in the United States to Parker Brothers. Registered in the United States in 1930, Ping-Pong (with dash) is still a registered wordmark of Parker Brothers, Inc. Contrary to a common misconception, the word does not originate from Chinese 乒乓 (pīngpāng), though there are possibilities that the coiners encountered Chinese themselves.

(UK politics) The exchange of proposed amendments between the two Houses of Parliament, particularly at the end of a session when compromises have to be made to complete the legislative process within the limited time available.


tabernacle

From Middle English tabernacle (14th century), from Old French tabernacle, from Latin tabernāculum (“tent, booth, shed”), the diminutive of taberna (“hut, shed”).

der

Any portable shrine used in heathen or idolatrous worship.

alttari

any portable shrine used in heathen or idolatrous worship

It was over these innocent necessary precautions that the local committees always showed their meanness. They liked giving over only one contribution to the evangelist, but they wanted nothing said about it till they themselves had been taken care of--till the rent of the hall or the cost of building a tabernacle, the heat, the lights, the advertising, and other expenses had been paid.

1927, Sinclair Lewis, chapter 13, in Elmer Gantry:

(originally Methodism) A temporary place of worship, especially a tent, for a tent meeting, as with a venue for revival meetings.

saarnateltta

(by extension) Any house of worship, especially a Mormon meetinghouse.

(figuratively) Any abode or dwelling place, or especially the human body as the temporary dwelling place of the soul, or life.

tomumaja

(nautical) A hinged device allowing for the easy folding of a mast 90 degrees from perpendicular, as for transporting the boat on a trailer, or passing under a bridge.

mastonkaatolaite

nautical: device allowing for the easy folding of a mast


pee

They have writing samples and examine the back loops of pees and the crosses of tees.

It said, in a whispering, buzzing voice, "Gee-you-ess-ess-ay-dash-em-ee-ar-ar-wye-dash-em-eye-en-gee-oh-dash-pee-eye-pee-dash-pee-ee-ar-ar-wye-dash-pee-eye-en-gee-oh."

The name of the Latin-script letter P/p.


rhotic

[ˈɹəʊ̯.tʰɪk]

Back-formation of rhotacism, coined in 1968 by John C. Wells.

Rhotic speech is common in Ireland, Scotland, much of the United States, Canada, West Country England, and many parts of the north and west of England.

Rhotic (or r-ful) dialects are linguistic relics in England, as shown in Map 7-5. Nonrhotic or r-less dialects have been displacing them since the seventeenth century. Among the linguistically most conservative population in England, represented by the NORMs of the SED, both rhotic and nonrhotic dialects are found throughout the country. The fact that the rhotic dialects are relics is indicated on Map 7-5 not by the predominance of nonrhotic dialects, but by the discontinuity of the regions where rhotic dialects are found. A century or so earlier, they covered even more of the country, and the three regions probably formed part of a continuous network.

1998, J. K. Chambers, Peter Trudgill, Dialectology, 2nd edition, Cambridge University Press, page 94:

Except for the Southland area, New Zealand English today is non-rhotic (Wells, 1982: 606). Australian, Tristanian and Port Stanley Falkland Islands English are also non-rhotic, as is South African English (except for some people who are native Afrikaans speakers – Wells 1982: 617). This has often been erroneously ascribed (for instance, in Trudgill, 1986a) to the fact that most of England was non-rhotic at the time of the main immigration to New Zealand. It is now obvious that this is not correct at all: of the eighty-four Mobile Unit speakers analysed, an astonishing 92% are rhotic to some degree.

2004, Peter Trudgill, New-Dialect Formation: The Inevitability of Colonial Englishes, Oxford University Press, page 68:

2009, Ingrid Rosenfelder, Rhoticity in educated Jamaican English, Thomas Hoffmann, Licia Siebers, World Englishes – Problems, Properties and Prospects: Selected Papers from the 13th IAWE Conference, John Benjamins Publishing Company,
Contrary to “traditional” descriptions in the literature, Jamaican English cannot be characterized as predominantly rhotic, exhibiting an overall degree of rhoticity of approximately 20 per cent.

(linguistics, of an English accent) That allows the phoneme /ɹ/ even when not followed by a vowel, as in bar (/bɑːɹ/) and bard or barred (/bɑːɹd/); (of an English speaker) who speaks with such an accent.


non-rhotic

/nɒnˈɹəʊtɪk/

In a non-rhotic accent, the word 'sort' can be pronounced like the word 'sought'.

Received Pronunciation
Received Pronunciation

Of an accent, most often one of English: not pronouncing the written letter "r" unless it is followed by a vowel, as in Received Pronunciation, most other accents of England, the Boston accent, traditional NYC English, many accents of southern Louisiana, Australian English, etc.


pie-eater

Wiganers do like pies, but the term Pie-eaters is actually an insult, dating back to a pit strike when Wigan miners were starved back to work before their St Helens counterparts, thereby eating humble pie.

2005, The Observer, "Get past the pies and there's a football team", 7 Aug 2005

(derogatory) A person from Wigan in northern England or the surrounding area.


ren

Learned borrowing from Egyptian rn, r:n-A2

For the Ren did not belong to the man, but came out of the Celestial Waters to enter an infant in the hour of his birth and might not stir again until it was time to go back.

(Egyptian mythology) One’s name, as part of the soul in ancient Egyptian mythology.


Douglas

en-proper noun

Douglas (countable and uncountable, plural Douglases)

Douglases (plural)
Douglass (alternative)

desc

→ Translingual: douglasi, douglasii (learned)

From a place name, Scottish Gaelic dubh (“black”) + glais (“stream”).

(countable) A male given name transferred from the surname.


Ezra

en-proper noun

Ezra (countable and uncountable, plural Ezras)

Ezras (plural)
Ez. (alternative)
Ezr. (alternative)

From the Biblical Hebrew עֶזְרָא (ʿezrā). Doublet of Esdras.

A male given name from Hebrew of biblical origin.


Aaron

From Latin Aaron, from Ancient Greek Ἀαρών (Aarṓn), from Hebrew אַהֲרֹן (ʾAhărōn), of unknown meaning, possibly meaning “bearer of martyrs”, or perhaps also, or instead, related to the Ancient Egyptian ꜥḥꜣ rw (“warrior lion”), though it has been suggested to also mean “elevated”, “exalted” or “high mountain”. Doublet of Harun.

- - - the Junior Prom with boys whose names are right out of the grade-school reader, not Aaron and Arnold and Marvin, but Johnny and Billy and Jimmy and Tod. Not Portnoy or Pincus, but Smith and Jones and Brown!

1969, Philip Roth, Portnoy's Complaint, Random House, published 2002, page 145:


adhere

en-verb

adhere (third-person singular simple present adheres, present participle adhering, simple past and past participle adhered)

adheres (present singular third-person)
adhering (participle present)
adhered (participle past)
adhered (past)
adhære (alternative)

From Middle English *adheren (suggested by Middle English adherande (“adhering, adherent”, present participle)), from Latin adhaerēre, adhaesum: ad (“to”) + haerēre (“to stick”). Compare French adhérer.

cog

The Dictionary of the Scots Language
w:Dictionary of the Scots Language

Scottish Language Dictionaries
w:Scottish Language Dictionaries

(intransitive, Scots law) To affirm a judgment.


Polynesian

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-Polynesian.wav

A language group spoken by these people.


advise

en-verb

advise (third-person singular simple present advises, present participle advising, simple past and past participle advised)

advises (present singular third-person)
advising (participle present)
advised (participle past)
advised (past)
advise (infinitive)
advize (alternative)
avise (alternative)
avize (alternative)

From Middle English avisen (“to perceive, consider, inform”), from Old French aviser, from avis, or from Late Latin advisō, from ad + visō, from Latin videō (“to see”), visum (“past participle of videō”). See also advice.

inh

(Scots law) To deliver judgment after a case has been reserved for further consideration.


Afar

A Cushitic language spoken in Ethiopia, Eritrea and Djibouti.


Afar

Afars (plural)
Afar (plural)
Qafar (alternative)

[...] ethnic groups, the Afars. The majority of the Somali-speaking Issas, the other main group, do support President Hassan Gouled and his RPP, though the Prime Minister, Barkat Gourad is an Afar himself.

Shortly thereafter he broke with Aref and supported independence. Aref was an Afar, and Gouled came from the Issa ethnic group, which for years had been at odds with the Afars.

1995, Neil A. Hamilton, Founders of Modern Nations: A Biographical Dictionary:

A member of the people who speak this language and reside in these regions.


Big Ben

Ben Caunt
Benjamin Hall, 1st Baron Llanover
Big Ben

Disputed, possibly after Sir Benjamin Hall, who oversaw the installation of the Great Bell, or after English boxer Ben Caunt.

Houses of Parliament
Houses of Parliament

The hour bell in the Elizabeth Tower (formerly known as the Clock Tower), adjacent to the Houses of Parliament in Westminster, London, United Kingdom.


World War I

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-World War I.wav

WWI (alternative)
World War 1 (alternative)
World War One (alternative)

(history) The war from 1914 to 1918 between the Entente Powers of the British Empire, Russian Empire, France, Italy, the United States and other allied nations, against the Central Powers represented by the German Empire, Austria-Hungary, the Ottoman Empire, and Bulgaria.

第１次世界大戦

だいいちじせかいたいせん


African

Africans (plural)
Afrikan (alternative)
Afric (alternative)

Attested as a noun in early New English Aphricane, Africans (plural), Middle English as Affrican, Aufrican and Old English as Africanas (“Africans”) (only plural). From Latin Āfricānae, from Āfricānus, from Āfricus.
The adjective appears in the 16th century, as Affricane, Africane, African.
Latin Āfricus is from Āfri (singular Āfer), the name of an ancient people of North Africa (near Carthage, in modern Tunisia), with the suffix -icus. Africānus is formed by addition of the -ānus suffix.
By surface analysis, Africa + -an.

Africans constitute significantly growing populations not only in major urban centers such as New York, Washington, D.C., Chicago, Los Angeles, Houston, and Atlanta but also in small and midsize cities in states such as Ohio and Maine.

2007, African Immigrant Religions in America, →ISBN:

But new research suggests another possibility: all Africans may have ancestry from “West Eurasian” populations which moved back into Africa after the “Out of Africa” event ~50,000 years ago.[…]

2019, Razib Khan, Arabia between Africa and Eurasia:

A native of Africa; also one ethnologically belonging to an African race.


nun

From Middle English nonne, nunne, from Old English nunne (“nun”), from Late Latin nonna (“nun, tutor”), originally (along with masculine form nonnus (“man”)) a term of address for elderly persons, perhaps from children's speech, reminiscent of nana, like papa etc. Doublet of nonna.

onomatopoeic

children's speech

Thus, when the nuns came to the mission and we saw that instead of murmuring soft blessings and gliding seraphically over the grass in diaphanous habits, they wore smart blouses and skirts and walked, laughed and talked in low twanging tones very much like our own American missionaries did, we were very disappointed.

1988, Tsitsi Dangarembga, Nervous Conditions, Faber & Faber Limited (2021), page 258:

A member of a Christian religious community of women who live by certain vows and usually wear a habit, (Roman Catholicism, specifically) those living together in a cloister.

non

member of a non-Christian religious community of women

Why laſt night, as Colonel Kill'em, Sir William Weezy, Lord Frederick Foretop, and I were careleſsly ſliding the Ranelagh round, picking our teeth, after a damn'd muzzy dinner at Boodle's, who ſhould trip by but an abbeſs, well known about town, with a ſmart little nun in her ſuite.

1770, Samuel Foote, The Lame Lover, a Comedy in Three Acts. […], London: […] Paul Vaillant; and sold by P[eter] Elmsly […]; and Robinson and Roberts, […], →OCLC, Act I, page 12:

"I mean to inform you," answered the Oxonian, with a grin on his face, "that those three nymphs, who have so much dazzled your optics, are three nuns, and the plump female is Mother .... of great notoriety [...]"

1881, Pierce Egan, chapter 8, in Life in London, page 205:

John S[tephen] Farmer
w:John Stephen Farmer

W[illiam] E[rnest] Henley
w:William Ernest Henley


nun

nuns (plural)
noon (alternative)
nūn (alternative)

Borrowed from the letter’s name in the respective language. Doublet of nu.

The fourteenth letter of many Semitic alphabets or abjads (Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew, Syriac, Arabic and others).


nun

Pronunciation spelling
pronunciation spelling


Alton

From Old English ǣwell (“river source”) + tūn (“settlement, town”).

...because I have learned something about cartoons from Alton Packard. There are two things about Mr Packard that I keep turning over in my mind. One is that his name sounds like Alton Parker, onetime presidential candidate, and the other is that, to me at least, he looks a little bit like Woodrow Wilson.

1920 The Lyceum Magazine, editor Ralph Albert Parlette, Volume 30, page 15


Teresa

First recorded as the name of a fourth-century Spanish saint. Of obscure origin; suggestions include Therasia or Thera, ancient name of the Greek island Thira.

My friends call me Terry. My husband always used my full name, Teresa. He said it made him feel like he was married to a foreign woman.

1980, Laura Furman, The Glass House, a Novella and Stories., Viking Press, →ISBN, page 76:

Cynthia and Melinda, reduced to Cindy and Mindy, as Carella had dreaded would happen from the moment she named them. Her older daughter had fared better. Tess, modern and sleek for Teresa, which conjured up cobblestoned streets in a mountain village in Potenza.

1999, Ed McBain, The Big Bad City, Simon and Schuster, →ISBN, page 139:

A female given name from Ancient Greek, the Spanish and Italian form of Theresa.


Asturian

The winning entry was a poem written in Asturian, one of the first such in Asturian literature.

2002, M. Teresa Turell, Multilingualism in Spain, page 167:

In Asturias/Asturies 18.3% of the respondents said they spoke Asturian always or most of the time with friends[…]

2007, Paolo Coluzzi, Minority language planning and micronationalism in Italy, page 272:

A Romance language spoken in Asturias, Spain.

阿斯圖里亞斯語 /阿斯图里亚斯语

Āsītúlǐyǎsī yǔ


Aymara

From Spanish aymara, possibly from Aymara or a Quechuan language. Attested in English since the mid 18th century.

In Potosi, Aymara is spoken in the Llica region, located north of the saltpan, and in the provinces comprising the region known as Norte de Potosi

1988, Xavier Albó, “Bilingualism in Bolivia”, in Christina Bratt Paulston, editor, International Handbook of Bilingualism and Bilingual Education, page 97:


Blackfoot

en-noun

Blackfoot (plural Blackfoots or Blackfoot or Blackfeet)

Blackfoots (plural)
Blackfoot (plural)
Blackfeet (plural)

Blackfoot (disambiguation)
Blackfoot Confederacy

Bears and other ferocious beasts resented man's intrusion into their domain; so, too, did the Blackfoot Indians and other tribes, whose savage hostility was a constant menace to the lives of the toiling engineers.

1954 February, Trevor Holloway, “Canada's Transcontinental Routes”, in Railway Magazine, page 128:

A member of a North American confederacy of several tribes.


Blackfoot

The Algonquian language of these people.

A city, the county seat of Bingham County, Idaho, United States.


Chamorro

/t͡ʃəˈmɒɹəʊ/

/t͡ʃəˈmɔɹoʊ/

An Austronesian language spoken by the indigenous native islanders of the Northern Mariana Islands and Guam.


America

Americas (plural)
Merica (alternative)
'Murica (alternative)
'murica (alternative)
Americas (alternative)

desc

→ Chinese: 亞美利加 /亚美利加

→ Chinese: 亞美利加 /亚美利加

→ Japanese: アメリカ

→ Malay: Amerika

→ Tokelauan: Amelika

/əˈmɛɹ.ɪ.kə/

/əˈmɛɹ.ə.kə/

/əˈmɛɹ.ɪ.kɔː/

Amerigo Vespucci
Martin Waldseemüller
Naming of the Americas
Richard Amerike

Etymology tree
Proto-Germanic *amalą
Proto-Indo-European *h₃reǵ-
Proto-Indo-European *-s
Proto-Indo-European *h₃rḗǵs
Proto-Celtic *rīxsbor.
Proto-Germanic *rīks
Proto-Germanic *Amalarīksder.
Proto-Indo-European *ḱey-
Proto-Indo-European *-mos
Proto-Indo-European *ḱóymos
Proto-Indo-European *tḱóymos
Proto-Germanic *haimaz
Proto-Germanic *rīks
Proto-Germanic *Haimarīksder.?
Italian Amerigoder.
New Latin Americalbor.
English America
Learned borrowing from New Latin America, feminine Latinized form of the Italian first name of Amerigo Vespucci (1454–1512). Amerigo is an Italian name derived from a Germanic language and is etymologically related to Henry and Emmerich. The earliest known use of America for the (South) American continent is on a 1507 map by Martin Waldseemüller; see Naming of the Americas for more.
Although this is the most widely accepted derivation, it has also been suggested that it could originate from the name of the Amerrisque mountains in Nicaragua (from Mayan), and another disputed theory is that it derives from the surname of Richard Amerike (1440–1503), whose surname is an anglicised form of Welsh ap Meurig (“son of Meurig”), from Old Welsh Mouric, which could be a rendition of Latin Mauritius (compare Maurice).


Amoy

Latin: amoyensis

From the Postal Romanization of Hokkien 廈門 /厦门 (Ēe-mûi), specifically the Zhangzhou Hokkien dialect.


Farsi

Apparently first used widely in English in the late 1960s or early 1970s. From Persian فارسی (fârsi), meaning "relating to Fars", the Arabicized form of the name of the province of Pars (Early Classical Persian پارس (pārs)) which was adopted in Iran following the Arab conquest of Persia in the 7th century. The sense for the hijra argot is from Hindi फ़ारसी (fārsī) from the same word.

Parsee (alternative)
Parsi (alternative)

That the Farsi or Persian is not a language derived from the Pehlevi, but a collateral and independent tongue, seems to be sufficiently certain.

1820, William Erskine, “On the sacred books and religion of the Parsis”, in Transactions of the Literary Society of Bombay, volume II, page 315:

In July 1984, Radio Iran Toilers began broadcasting in Farsi from Afghanistan; by the end of 1988 it was transmitting twenty-one hours a week.

1991, Richard Felix Staar, Foreign Policies of the Soviet Union, page 91:

The method of writing Farsi is logical, although reading can be trickier, as one has to guess at the unwritten consonants of unfamiliar words.

1999, Maria O'Shea, Culture shock! Iran, page 75:

We chatted away in Farsi.

2001, Dan Baumann, Imprisoned in Iran: Love's Victory Over Fear, page 20:

For instance, in Farsi pošt means 'back' (noun) as in pošt=am dard mikonad 'my back hurts' […]

2009, Vit Bubenik, "The rise and development of the possessive construction in Middle Iranian with parallels in Albanian", page 97 in Grammatical Change in Indo-European Languages, Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 305


Farsi

An argot of hijras, or catamites, in North India and Pakistan.


Farsi

en-adj

Farsi (comparative more Farsi, superlative most Farsi)

more Farsi (comparative)
most Farsi (superlative)
Parsee (alternative)
Parsi (alternative)


Adi

A diminutive of the male given names Aditya or Adit.

A diminutive of the female given name Aditi.


Inuktitut

Transliteration of Inuktitut ᐃᓄᒃᑎᑐᑦ (inoktitot, “like the Inuit”).

translit

I can hear a swell of laughter and boisterous merriment in Inuktitut.

2018, Tanya Tagaq, Split Tooth, And Other Stories (2023), page 46:


katakana

en-noun

katakana (countable and uncountable, plural katakana or katakanas)

or katakanas (katakana plural)
katagana (alternative)

/ˌkætəˈkænə/

/ˌkætəˈkɑːnə/

/ˌkɑtəˈkɑːnə/

(uncountable) A Japanese syllabary used when writing words borrowed from foreign languages other than Chinese, specific names of plants and animals and other jargon, onomatopoeia, or to emphasize a word or phrase. Also used to write the Ainu language.


Kongo

A Bantu language (or family of languages) of Central Africa.


Lombard

en-proper noun

Lombard (countable and uncountable, plural Lombards)

Lombards (plural)
Lumbard (alternative)
Lumbar (alternative)
lombard (alternative)

From Middle English Lombard, Lumbard, borrowed from Old French Lombard, Lombart (“a Lombard”), from Late Latin langobardus, longobardus (“a Lombard”), from Germanic, derived from the Proto-Germanic elements *langaz + *bardaz; equivalent to long + beard. Some sources derive the second element instead from Proto-Germanic *bardǭ, *barduz (“axe”), related to German Barte (“axe”). Doublet of Langobard. Compare longbeard. Compare with Old English Langbeardas (“Lombards”).

Broadwater County
Broadwater County#English

A ghost town in Broadwater County, Montana, United States, named after A. G. Lombard.


Luganda

/luːˈɡɑːndə/

Then it dawned on her. He did not know any Luganda. All along he had not understood a word she had said.

2020, Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi, The First Woman, Oneworld Publications, page 48:

A Bantu language spoken mostly in Uganda.


Malay

en-noun

Malay (countable and uncountable, plural Malays)

Etymology tree
Malay Melayuder.
English Malay
From Malay Melayu, from Malayu, a kingdom on Sumatra's eastern coast (today's Jambi), mentioned by the Chinese Monk Yijing as 末羅瑜國 and during the Yuan (1271-1368) and Ming (1368-1644) dynasties as 木剌由, 麻里予兒, 巫來由 and 無來由. First attested in English as 1598.
The oldest known inscriptions in the Malay language were found at Kedukan Bukit (dated 673) and Talang Tuo (dated 684), both in the vicinity of Palembang in southern Sumatra, and at Kota Kapur (dated 686) on Bangka island west of Sumatra. Exonymous derivation from Malayalam മല (mala, “mountain”) has not been demonstrated.

etymon

(countable) A person of Malay ancestry, referring to a diverse group of Austronesian peoples inhabiting the Malay archipelago and Malay peninsula in Southeast Asia.


Manx

Altered from Maniske, from assumed Old Norse *manskr, an adjectival form of Mǫn (“Isle of Man”), from Old Irish Mana; compare with Norwegian Bokmål mansk.
Also influenced by Manx Manninagh, an adjectival form of Mannin (“Isle of Man”), Isle of Man; cf Scottish Gaelic Manainneach and Irish Manannach.

(uncountable) A Goidelic language spoken on the Isle of Man.

մեներեն

a Goidelic language spoken on the Isle of Man

the long-haired version of the Manx cat breed


Maya

Borrowed from Spanish maya, from Yucatec Maya mayab (“flat”), a self-designation of the northern Maya for themselves, in the form maya’ found in compounds and phrases e.g. maya’ wíinik (“Maya man”).


Maya

From Maria, ultimately from Hebrew, and from Maia, from Latin.

When her little friends asked her what her name was, her father replied that it was Conchita - his diminutive for Maria de la Concepción. "Con-what?" they would ask again, aware, apparently, that con in French is a fool, an idiot. So her parents started calling her Maria, which from the little girl's lips soon began to sound like Maya. "Maya!" exclaimed her father. "It's perfect. It means the greatest illusion on earth." So Maya it was from then on - Maya Walter.

1988, Arianna Stassinopoulos Huffington, Picasso, Creator and Destroyer, Simon and Schuster, →ISBN, page 240:

A female given name from Hebrew of modern usage.


Maya

Transliteration of Sanskrit माया (māyā).

Eventually, Pran and Savita decided by correspondence on Maya. Its two simple syllables meant, among other things: the goddess Lakshmi, illusion, fascination, art, the goddess Durga, kindness, and the name of the mother of Buddha. It also meant: ignorance, delusion, fraud, guile, and hypocrisy; but no one who named their daughter Maya ever paid any attention to those pejorative possibilities.
- - - 'Why ever not, Ma?' said Meenakshi.'It's a very Bengali name, a very nice name.'

1993, Vikram Seth, A Suitable Boy, Phoenix House, →ISBN, page 891:

A female given name from Sanskrit used in India.


Papago

Borrowed from Spanish Pápago, itself from O'odham Ba꞉bawĭkoʼa (“they eat tepary beans”).

der

In the valley of the Gila and on its tributaries from the northeast are the Pimas, Maricopas, and Papagos.

1895, J[ohn] W[esley] Powell, chapter I, in Canyons of the Colorado, Meadville, PA: Flood & Vincent; republished as The Exploration of the Colorado River and Its Canyons, New York: Dover, 1961, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 24:

(historical) A Uto-Aztecan people of southern Arizona and Sonora in northern Mexico. Today they are known as the Tohono O'odham ("the Desert People").


Papiamento

From Papiamentu Papiamento. Compare Portuguese papeamento (“chatter”).

A Creole language spoken on the Caribbean islands of Aruba, Curaçao, and Bonaire.


Mohican

From their self-designation in Mahican [Term?] (literally “people of the estuary”).

bor

The Mohican are an Algonquian-speaking people.

An indigenous people of New England; the Mohicans.


Mohican

(British) A hairstyle where both sides are shaved, with the hair in the centre kept long and made to stand on end.


Romansch

Borrowed from Romansch romansch, romontsch, rumantsch et al., from Medieval Latin rōmānicē, from Vulgar Latin rōmānicē (“in the Roman manner; in a Romance language”, adverb), from Latin rōmānicus. Perhaps influenced by the Germanic suffix seen in English as -ish (German -isch, -sch). Doublet of romance.

der

Romanche (alternative)
Romansh (alternative)
Rumansch (alternative)
Rumantsch (alternative)

(strict sense) A Rhaeto-Romance language (or dialect continuum) spoken in the Graubünden/Grisons canton of Switzerland; it is one of the four official languages of Switzerland.


Romany

Alternative form of Romani (“the Indo-Aryan language of this people”).


Scottish

From Middle English Scottich, from Old English Sċyttisċ, equivalent to Scot + -ish. Compare West Frisian Skotsk (“Scottish”), Dutch Schots (“Scottish”), German schottisch (“Scottish”), Danish skotsk (“Scottish”), Icelandic skoskur (“Scottish”). Doublet of Scotch and Scot.

(uncountable) short for Scottish English, the varieties of English spoken in Scotland.


Sepedi

a dialect of the Northern Sotho language.


Serbo-Croatian

/ˌsɜː(ɹ)bəʊkɹəʊˈeɪʃən/

Serbocroatian (alternative)
SCr. (alternative)

The South Slavic language of which Bosnian, Croatian, Montenegrin and Serbian are literary standards.


Sotho

From Sotho, from Sotho -sotho, from Sotho motho.

Sutho (alternative)
Soto (alternative)
Suto (alternative)

A group of closely related Bantu lects spoken in South Africa, Lesotho, Botswana, and Zambia.

(specifically) Sesotho (“the language”) (Southern Sotho).


Sotho

Sotho (plural)
Sutho (alternative)
Soto (alternative)
Suto (alternative)

A Mosotho (“person”); a member of the Basotho (“people”).


Sranan

Sranan Tongo, the English-based creole of Suriname.


Tswana

From Tswana Tswana, the stem of Motswana/Batswana/Setswana. See Botswana for more.

A Bantu people living in Botswana and South Africa.


Tswana

The Bantu language of these people; Setswana.


Xhosa

en-noun

Xhosa (countable and uncountable, plural Xhosas or Xhosa)

Borrowed from Xhosa (ísí)Xhosa (“Xhosa language”) and (úḿ)Xhosa (“Xhosa person”), where the sequence xh denotes a click (/ˈǁʰoːsa/):
*
 Audio: (file)

bor+

Xhosa - English & English - Xhosa Translator at Albion College

(uncountable) The language of these people, a Bantu language related to Zulu.


anglo

Spanish was the only "foreign" language taught in the school, where most of the students spoke Spanish as a first language, and it was taught by an Anglo teacher from textbooks written by and for Anglos […] Somehow, the school administration saw no contradiction in rewarding Anglo students for learning to conjugate ser while punishing Chicano students for speaking Spanish on the school grounds.

1984 February 4, David Morris, “Different Origins: Joto Güero del West Side”, in Gay Community News, volume 11, number 28, page 15:

(Southwestern US, informal, sometimes offensive) A North American, especially a white one (regardless of actual ethnicity), whose native language is English (as opposed to Americans who have another native language).


Apache

From American Spanish apache, most likely from Zuni ˀa˙paču (“Navajos”), or possibly from the Yavapai word ʔpačə, meaning "people". The web server software was named to honor the Apache people, although much has been made of the fact that its design was "patchy" (constructed by assembling software patches). See Apache HTTP Server § Name.

The group of languages used by any of several Athabascan-speaking peoples of the American southwest excluding Navajo, i.e. Chiricahua, Jicarilla, Lipan, Mescalero, Plains Apache, or Western Apache.

Apache, a town in Oklahoma, United States.


Apache

Apaches (plural)
Apache (plural)
apache (alternative)

Away up at the sources of the Gila, where the pines and cedars stand and where creeks and valleys are found, is a part of the Apache land.

Any of several Athabascan-speaking peoples of the American southwest excluding Navajo, i.e., Chiricahua, Jicarilla, Lipan, Mescalero, Plains Apache, or Western Apache.


Amerindian

en-adj

Amerindian (comparative more Amerindian, superlative most Amerindian)

more Amerindian (comparative)
most Amerindian (superlative)

/ˌæməˈɹɪndɪən/

/ˌæməɹˈɪndiən/

Blend of American + Indian, attested since about 1900.


Amerindian

/ˌæməˈɹɪndɪən/

/ˌæməɹˈɪndiən/


tri-

(chemistry) Used in combination with a known element name (e.g. 'tri-silicon') to designate an unknown element that would reside three periods lower than the known element on a Mendeleev-type periodic table. See Mendeleev's predicted elements.


Celt

From Latin Celtae (singular Celta) from Ancient Greek Κελτοί (Keltoí).
English Celts is from the 17th century. Until the mid 19th century, /sɛlt/ is the only recorded pronunciation. A consciously archaizing pronunciation /kɛlt/ was advocated during Irish and Welsh nationalism beginning in the 1850s.

(historical) A member of one of the ancient peoples of Western Europe called Celtae by the Romans.


Celtic

en-proper noun

Celtic (countable and uncountable, plural Celtics)

Borrowed from French celtique or Latin celticus. First attested in the 17th century.

A branch of the Indo-European languages that was spread widely over Western and Central Europe in the pre-Christian era.

Any of several sports teams. See Wikipedia for a list.

After the draft, Brown became a Celtic for six years.

(countable) A player for any of several teams named the Celtics.

(soccer) Celtic F.C., a football club from Glasgow, Scotland.


Celtic

en-adj

Celtic (comparative more Celtic, superlative most Celtic)

more Celtic (comparative)
most Celtic (superlative)
Keltic (alternative)


tee

* From Middle English [Term?], from Old English te, from Latin te (the name of the letter T).
* (computing): By analogy with a T-shaped pipe that sends fluids in two directions.

The word length, which contains only four sounds l e ng th, is usually spell'd thus, el ee en gee tee aitch.

1773 October, The Monthly Review Or Literary Journal Enlarged:

They have writing samples and examine the back loops of pees and the crosses of tees.

ETA [is spoken] as "ee-tee-ay" instead of "I SPELL Echo Tango Alfa".

2016 CCEB, Communications Instructions Radiotelephone Procedures: ACP125 (G), p. 3-5

The name of the Latin-script letter T/t.


reduce

en-verb

reduce (third-person singular simple present reduces, present participle reducing, simple past and past participle reduced)

reduces (present singular third-person)
reducing (participle present)
reduced (participle past)
reduced (past)

From Middle English reducen, from Old French reduire, from Latin redūcō (“reduce”); from re- (“back”) + dūcō (“lead”). See duke, and compare with redoubt.

(transitive, Scots law) To annul by legal means.


Tanya

Borrowed in the twentieth century from the Russian pet form Та́ня (Tánja) of Татья́на (Tatʹjána, “Tatiana”).

Tania (alternative)
Taniya (alternative)

“Did Tanya... why, by the way, was she named Tanya? It's not a Southern name, is it?” “No,” said Fanny, “it's as Russian as Vladimir. But only a few people ever pronounced it correctly. I always did. Most people said ‘Tan-ya’, like the color tan. She and her mother hated it when that happened, and complained. I suggested they replace the a in Tan with an o, but they preferred to make a lifelong habit of correcting people.”

1989, Alice Walker, The Temple of My Familiar, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, →ISBN, page 298:

A diminutive of the female given names Tatiana (from Russian) or Tetyana (from Ukrainian).


shilling

Sranan Tongo: sren

From Middle English schilling, shilling, from Old English sċilling, from Proto-Germanic *skillingaz, equivalent to skill + -ing. Doublet of scalding and schilling.

look as if one had lost a shilling and found sixpence

A great bargain also had been[…]the arm-chair in which Bunting now sat forward, staring into the dull, small fire. In fact, that arm-chair had been an extravagance of Mrs. Bunting. She had wanted her husband to be comfortable after the day's work was done, and she had paid thirty-seven shillings for the chair.

1913, Mrs. [Marie] Belloc Lowndes, chapter I, in The Lodger, London: Methuen, →OCLC; republished in Novels of Mystery: The Lodger; The Story of Ivy; What Really Happened, New York, N.Y.: Longmans, Green and Co., […], [1933], →OCLC, page 0016:

(historical) A coin formerly used in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Malta, Australia, New Zealand and many other Commonwealth countries worth twelve old pence, or one twentieth of a pound sterling.


decimalisation

en-noun

decimalisation (usually uncountable, plural decimalisations)

decimalisations (plural)
decimalization (alternative)

Specifically, conversion of the currencies of the United Kingdom and Ireland in 1971 from pounds, shillings and pence to a decimal system in which one pound was worth 100 new pence (later renamed simply pence).


Thatcherism

From Thatcher + -ism. Popularized by Jamaican-born British sociologist and cultural theorist Stuart Hall in an article in Marxism Today, see quotations.

coin

Thus “Thatcherism” is—give or take one or two elements—the corresponding political bedfellow of a period of capitalist recession: the significant differences between this and other variants of Tory “philosophy” being conceived as without any specific pertinent political or ideological effects.

1979 January, Stuart Hall, “The Great Moving Right Show”, in Marxism Today, page 14:

(UK politics) The political ideology attributed to the governments of British prime minister Margaret Thatcher (1979–1990), characterised by, among other things, a free market economy, privatisation, low taxation, austerity and opposition to unionisation.

撒切爾主義 /撒切尔主义

political ideology of Thatcher's governments


Thatcherite

en-adj

Thatcherite (comparative more Thatcherite, superlative most Thatcherite)

more Thatcherite (comparative)
most Thatcherite (superlative)

/ˈθæt͡ʃəɹaɪt/

From Thatcher + -ite, named after British prime minister Margaret Thatcher (1925–2013).

named-after

a Thatcherite policy

Morgan, by his own description represented the new spirit of Thatcherite enterprise.

(UK politics) Of or relating to Thatcherism.

He has a Thatcherite outlook on life.


Thatcherite

/ˈθæt͡ʃəɹaɪt/

(UK politics) An advocate of Thatcherism.


Thatcher's children

She has not begun to stem the tide of British ugliness—the yobbish teenagers shivering in their torn gear; the shoddy streets littered with fast-food packaging; the drunks urinating on London's tube platforms; the drug culture. It is facile to call those concerned “Thatcher's children”: she is not responsible for their actions.

London's financial district, like New York's, had its “big bang,” after which, as though from dragon's teeth, Yuppies sprang up, armed with Porsches and mobile telephones. They included, inevitably, some unattractive specimens, and much of their wealth has proved evanescent. To call them “Thatcher's children” is both unfair and unhistorical. Just the same corner-cutting, money-obsessed types can be found in the novels of Trollope and Galsworthy. At the other end of the scale are the workers in moribund industries, the unmarried mothers, and the feckless young, all those who have come to expect more from the welfare state than the welfare state could ever provide: They too are called “Thatcher's children”: but their problems would have existed whatever government was in power.

1990, Anthony Lejeune, “Class”, in National Review, volume 42, number 21, pages 81–84:

Negus (2002), for example, characterizes intermediaries in the music industry in London as “public schoolboys”; in Manchester they have been seen as “Thatcher's children,” the unemployed and disaffected.

2005, Justin O'Connor, “Cities, Culture and ‘Transitional Economies’: Developing Cultural Industries in St. Petersburg”, in John Hartley, editor, Creative Industries, Wiley-Blackwell, page 255:

The social group in Britain that came to be known as ‘Thatcher's children’ (benefiting from the right-wing monetarist policies of Margaret Thatcher's government) were also called ‘yuppies’ (young, upwardly-mobile professionals, especially those working in money markets and the Stock Exchange). They often originated in the south-east of England and their profit motives were legitimised by government policy in favour of free market economics.

2007, Nikolas Coupland, Style: Language Variation and Identity, Cambridge University Press, page 96:

Non-unionism was now the norm across swathes of the private sector so that only an estimated 16% of employees were organised by trade unions by 2006. Increasingly younger workers aged between sixteen and twenty-four – known as Thatcher's children – saw little point in being trade union members.

2007, Anthony Seldon, Blair's Britain, 1997–2007, Cambridge University Press, page 228:

People who grew up or were born in the United Kingdom during the premiership of Margaret Thatcher (1979–1990) and who adopted the ideology of Thatcherism.


Adonis

(rare) A male given name from Ancient Greek.


sad

Alternative form of saad (“Arabic letter”)


PDD

People Demand Democracy
w:People Demand Democracy

(UK politics) Initialism of People Demand Democracy.


Holy Grail

the Holy Grail (canonical)
Holy Grails (plural)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-Holy Grail.wav

From Middle English Holy Grayle.
(web page layout): So called because it was traditionally difficult to achieve with the available markup.

(Arthurian legend) An artifact in Arthurian mythology, being the cup used by Christ at the Last Supper and in which some of his blood was caught during the crucifixion.


George

→ Arabic: جورج (jorj)

→ Cebuano: George

→ Cantonese: 佐治 (zo2 zi6)

→ Chinese: 喬治 /乔治 (Qiáozhì)

→ Hawaiian: Keoki

→ Japanese: ジョージ (Jōji)

→ Korean: 조지 (Joji)

→ Maori: Hōri
→ English: hori

→ Persian: جورج (jorj)

→ Swedish: George

Name of an early saint, from Middle English George, from Latin Geōrgius, from Ancient Greek Γεώργῐος (Geṓrgĭos), from γεωργός (geōrgós, “farmer, earth worker”), from γῆ (gê, “earth”) (combining form γεω- (geō-)) + ἔργον (érgon, “work”) Doublet of Jorge and Geevarghese.
The aircraft autopilot sense is probably from George DeBeeson, who patented an early (1931) autopilot system, and/or a reference to the expression let George do it. The Pullman porter sense derives from George Pullman, who hired Black people to staff his sleeping cars, and the patrons of the service seeing the Black people as servants of George Porter, much like how an enslaved person was named after the enslaver.

Our ancient word of courage faire saint George / Inspire vs with the spleene of fierie Dragons,

c. 1593 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedy of Richard the Third: […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene iii], page 203:

George and Charles are unlucky in this respect; they have no diminutives, and what a mouthful of monosyllables they are! names royal too, and therefore unshortened. A king must be of a very rare class who could afford to be called by shorthand;

1830, Mary Russell Mitford, Our Village: Fourth Series: Cottage Names::

George... don't do that!

Roy Davis Stubbs, Eatonton, Judge. Son of Robert D. and Maud (Middleton) Stubbs. [...] Married Miss George Smith Feb. 14, 1918 in Knoxville, Tenn.

1925, [US state of] Georgia's Official Register, page 100:

2004, George Sargent Janes Leubuscher, Douglas W. Patton, A Girl Named George: My First Hundred Years

A diminutive of the female given names Georgina or Georgia; also used in the conjoined name George Ann(e).


Jorge

Derived from Spanish and Portuguese Jorge, from Ancient Greek Γεώργιος (Geṓrgios). Doublet of George.

A male given name from Spanish or Portuguese, equivalent to English George.


Semitic

From Semite + -ic (18th century), from German semitisch, from Ancient Greek Σήμ (Sḗm), from the Hebrew שֵׁם (Šēm, “Shem”), the name of the eldest son of Noah in biblical tradition (Genesis 5.32, 6.10, 10.21), considered the forefather of the Semitic peoples. Perhaps derived from Akkadian 𒈬 (šumu, literally “name" or "son”). The word was coined and first applied to the Semitic languages by August Ludwig von Schlözer in 1781.

uder

semitic (alternative)
Shemitic (alternative)
shemitic (alternative)

Of or pertaining to a subdivision of Afroasiatic Semitic languages: Amharic, Arabic, Aramaic, Syriac, Akkadian, Hebrew, Maltese, Tigrigna, Phoenician etc.

semitik

pertaining to the Semitic subdivision of Afroasiatic languages

Of or pertaining to the Semites; of or pertaining to one or more Semitic peoples.

(biblical) Of or pertaining to the descendants of Shem, the eldest of three sons of Noah.

(in particular) Of or pertaining to the Israeli, Jewish, or Hebrew people.

Thus we trace ever and again the similarities which are to be found among the Semitic religions.

1893, George Thomas Bettany, Mohammedanism and Other Religions of Mediterranean Countries, page 45:

The Semitic religions (Christianity and Islam) are nationally honored in much of Africa.

2011, Makau Mutua, Human Rights: A Political and Cultural Critique, page 114:

In contrast to these Semitic religions some religions of Indian origin like Buddhism and Jainism, are pacifist to the extent of banning the killing of animals even for food.

2005, Xavier William, World Religions, True Beliefs and New Age Spirituality, page 45:

Of or pertaining to any of the religions which originated among the Semites; Abrahamic.

On the other hand, scholars say that the Philistines were an Indo-European people not related to the Semitic Palestinians.

2008, Gary A. Tobin, The Trouble with Textbooks, page 93:

For quotations using this term, see Citations:Semitic.


Thomas

en-proper noun

Thomas (countable and uncountable, plural Thomases)

→ Hawaiian: Kamaki

→ Maori: Tāmati

→ Scottish Gaelic: Tòmas

Thomas of Bayeux
Thomas the Presbyter
Thomas the Slav

Inherited from Middle English Thomas, from Latin Thōmās m (as in the Vulgate), from Ancient Greek Θωμᾶς m (Thōmâs), the Biblical Greek transcription of Aramaic תאומא or תאמא (“twin”), the nickname of one of the Twelve Apostles.
In the gospel of John (11:16, 20:24), the Aramaic nickname is also translated into Greek, as δίδυμος m (dídumos). Used as a given name since the Middle Ages, e.g. Thomas the Presbyter (7th century), Thomas the Slav (8th century), Thomas of Bayeux (died 1100).
(infidel or doubter): In reference to the doubting Apostle.

"Good,—that's a whack. What's your name?" / "Becky Thatcher. What's yours? Oh, I know. It's Thomas Sawyer." / "That's the name they lick me by. I'm Tom when I'm good. You call me Tom, will you?"

1876, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], chapter VI, in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Hartford, Conn.: The American Publishing Company, →OCLC, page 70:

- - - goodness we scarcely have a name for the baby yet now all of you must take a vote, all of you, but let's have a nice simple name like Thomas don't you think I hate elaborate names, do please all of you vote for Thomas..."

1941, Judith Kelly, Marriage is a Private Affair, Harper, published 1944, page 133:

A male given name from Aramaic of biblical origin, popular since the 13th century.


Joseph

Joseph (countable and uncountable, plural Josephs)

→ Maori: Hohepa

From Middle English Ioseph, ultimately from Biblical Hebrew יוֹסֵף (Yoséf, literally “(God) shall add”); a son of Jacob.

der

I'm going to call him Joseph / or Josephine if it's a girl. / Why? / Because it's a strong name, / Joe, Joseph. / You give a kid a name like Cameron / or Alfred, or something like that, / and they end up wearing glasses / and looking at computers for the rest of their life. / - - - So Joe it is. / He'll turn out strong. Strong and smart.

1998, Steven Herrick, A Place Like This, Univ. of Queensland Press, →ISBN, page 86:


Joe

Short form (diminutive form) of various names beginning with Jo..., particularly the male names Joseph and, less often, Joel, Josiah and Josias. The spelling Jo is used more often for diminutives of similar female names.

"With a name like Joe," Joe always said, "I had to open a bar and grill, just so I could put up a sign saying 'Joe's Bar and Grill'."

1981 Orson Scott Card, Second Movement, Nebula Winners: Science Fiction Writers of America, Harper&Row, 1981, page 207

A diminutive of the male given names Joseph, Josiah, Joel, or Josias.

(rare) Alternative form of Jo: a diminutive of various female given names.


Xavier

/ɪɡˈzeɪ.vɪə/

Toponymic surname of a 16th-century saint born in the Kingdom of Navarre, Francis de Xavier, from a place name in the Kingdom of Navarre, originally from Basque Xabier. Doublet of Echeverría.

"Full name please." "Maurice Xavier Wu." "Where did you get the Xavier?" "My father was a missionary," he said.

1976, Don DeLillo, Ratner's Star, Knopf, →ISBN, page 337:

'I keep telling you to call me Xavier,' he interjected silkily, aware that her reluctance to do so intrigued him. 'Xavier,' Laura agreed, and then hesitated. How could his name be so...so...enticing? Because it was foreign to her lips―lingering there like the juice of a fruit she had never tasted before? Or because it was impossible to say without first softening your voice?

2007, Sharon Kendrick, The Sheikh's English Bride, Harlequin, →ISBN, page 60:

A male given name from Spanish [in turn from Basque].


Bern

Abbreviations
* Clipping of Bernard.
* Clipping of Bernadette.
* Clipping of Bernice.

A diminutive of the male given name Bernard, variant of Bernie.

A diminutive of the female given names Bernadette or Bernice, variant of Bernie.


Geneva

Mentioned in Latin texts as Genava. Probably via a Proto-Celtic *genwā from Proto-Indo-European *ǵénw-eh₂ (“knee”), a derivative of *ǵónu in the sense of a bending river or estuary, possibly akin to Genoa.

/d͡ʒəˈniːvə/

A female given name transferred from the place name or confused with Genevieve or Ginevra.


Yankee

Yankees (plural)
Yanky (alternative)
Yengee (alternative)

First attested in 1765, when it was described as "a name of derision … given by the Southern people on the Continent to those of New England". Various suggestions have been made as to its origin: that it derives from a Cherokee word meaning "slave" or "coward" and was applied to the New Englanders by the Virginians because they refused to aid them in a war against the Cherokees; that it derives from Yengees, a Native American corruption of English; and that it comes from Janke, a pet form of the common Dutch forename Jan. The OED regards the last of these as "perhaps the most plausible".

...in a short time, a kind of infectious mirth and pride in their bargains took possession of the place, and every one bought something, holding out their purchases to view, and praising them in the words and phraseology of the young yankees, who, finding their own importance, were not slow to avail themselves of it,...

1842, [anonymous collaborator of Letitia Elizabeth Landon], chapter XXXIX, in Lady Anne Granard; or, Keeping up Appearances. […], volume II, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, page 194:

(chiefly Commonwealth, sometimes derogatory) A native or inhabitant of the United States.

[…]so that I couldn't help telling her, sir, that in our country, leastways in Virginia (they say the Yankees are very pert), young people don't speak of their elders so.

1857–1859, W[illiam] M[akepeace] Thackeray, chapter XXXIV, in The Virginians. A Tale of the Last Century, volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Bradbury & Evans, […], published 1858–1859, →OCLC:

“So, he is the father of Emmie Slattery’s baby,” thought Scarlett. “Oh, well. What else can you expect from a Yankee man and a white-trash girl?”

1936 June 30, Margaret Mitchell, Gone with the Wind, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company, →OCLC; republished New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company, 1944, →OCLC, part I, page 71:

(chiefly Southern US) A native or inhabitant of the Northern United States.

я́нкі

native or inhabitant of the Northern USA

(chiefly southern Louisiana) An Anglo, as opposed to someone with French ancestry; a native or inhabitant of the rest of the United States.


Uri

A male given name from Hebrew of biblical origin.


Wallis

en-proper noun

Wallis (countable and uncountable, plural Wallises)

* (surname): The surname is an Old English byname for a Welshman or Breton, from Old French waleis (“foreign”). The Welsh hamlet may be derived from this.


Thor

Representing Old Norse Þórr. Cognate with Old English Þunor, Swedish Tor.

A male given name from the Germanic languages occasionally borrowed from Scandinavia.


Socrates

From Ancient Greek Σωκράτης (Sōkrátēs). Doublet of Sokratis.

Accordingly, even though readers always and understandably speak of the theories adumbrated by Socrates here as "Plato's theories", one ought not to speak of them so without some compunction--the writing itself, and also Plato the author, present these always in a spirit of open-ended exploration, and sometimes there are contextual clues indicating that Socrates exaggerates or goes what the argument truly justifies, and so on.

1996, John M. Cooper, “Introduction”, in Plato: Complete Works, Hackett, page xxii:

A male given name from Ancient Greek of mostly historical use, known after a Greek philosopher.


diet

diets (plural)
diët (alternative)
diate (alternative)

From Middle English diet, dyet, from Old French diete, from Medieval Latin diēta, diaeta (“a public assembly; set day of trial; a day's journey”), from Ancient Greek δῐ́αιτα (dĭ́aita, “way of living, living space; decision, judgement”), influenced by Latin diēs (“day”).

der

(Scots law) A criminal proceeding in court.


ward

en-noun

ward (countable and uncountable, plural wards)

→ Swahili: wodi

From Middle English ward, warde, from Old English weard (“watching, ward, protection, guardianship; advance post; waiting for, lurking, ambuscade”), from Proto-West Germanic *wardu, from Proto-Germanic *wardō (“protection, attention, keeping”), an extension of the stem *wara- (“attentive”) (English wary, beware), from Proto-Indo-European *wer- (“to cover”).
Cognate with German Warte (“watchtower”), warten (“wait for”); English guard is a parallel form which came via Old French.

inh

(historical, Scots law) Land tenure through military service.

Protection, defence.
Land tenure through military service.


hiragana

en-noun

hiragana (countable and uncountable, plural hiraganas or hiragana)

hiraganas (plural)
hiragana (plural)
hirakana (alternative)
firagana (alternative)

/ˌhɪ.ɹəˈɡæ.nə/

/ˌhɪ.ɹəˈɡɑː.nə/

(uncountable) The main syllabary for the Japanese language, used to represent native Japanese words, including particles, and when kanji is used, to represent verb and adjective endings.


family name

Yeah, we named her Mildred. It's an old family name. Don't worry, though. She also has four middle names to choose from.

He had the name of Jeremy given to him, because Jeremiah, as his father said, was a family name; and there was an advantage in curtailing a syllable, and in shewing a preference towards the names of the New Testament over those of the old.

1840 March, John Bowring, “Memoirs of Jeremy Bentham”, in Tait’s Edinburgh Magazine for 1840, volume VII, number LXXV, Edinburgh: William Tait, […], page 169, column 1:

(uncommon) A given name common within a family or given because of another family member.


romanji

roumanji (alternative)
rōmanji (alternative)


Piemontese

Language spoken in Piedmont, region in the Northwest of Italy.


Liliana

A female given name from Latin, a Latinate form of Lilian, or borrowed from Italian or Spanish.


ufo

Reading of UFO as a word in its own right.


unidentified flying object

unidentified flying object (plural unidentified flying objects)

The phrase is usually attributed to US Air Force officer Edward J. Ruppelt (1923–1960) who coined it as a replacement of the terms flying saucer and flying disk.


flying saucer

From an interview given by amateur pilot Kenneth Arnold who described seeing nine flying objects that were "moving like saucers being skimmed across a lake". The description was not meant to describe the shape of the objects, only how they maneuvered, yet the misinterpretation took hold and gained popularity.

en:Flying saucer (confectionery)
en:flying saucer

Some connect the recent spate of flying saucer sightings with a rumored top-secret military aviation project.

An engram is NOT [...] One of the little green men Americans claim have crashed in flying saucers.

1950 December 6, The Sydney Morning Herald, page 3, column 5:

unidentified flying object
unidentified flying object

(informal) A disc-shaped unidentified flying object or UFO; originally in reference to sightings by aviator Kenneth Arnold in Washington in 1947.

թռչող ափսե

tʻṙčʻoġ apʻse


Ecclesiastical Latin

The Latin language as spoken, written, and used in the Christian church and in church services.


Vulgar Latin

(linguistics, historical) The Latin language as spoken by the Roman people, as opposed to Classical Latin as written in formal literature. Developed into Proto-Romance and descendant languages in the Early Middle Ages.


Martha

* From Latin Martha, from Ancient Greek Μάρθα (Mártha), from Aramaic מָרְתָא (mārtā, “mistress”), feminine of מרא (mārā). Doublet of Marfa.
* (humidity chamber): From the use of Martha Stewart-branded storage closets in the construction of early units.

They wanted to call her Helen, but I did put my foot down there. Knowing what her mother and father looked like! I tried hard for Martha or Dorcas or something sensible - but it was no good - waste of breath.

1947, Agatha Christie, The Labours of Hercules:

A female given name from Aramaic of biblical origin.


Aeneas

From Latin Aenēās, from Ancient Greek Αἰνείας (Aineías).

And there he found a certain man named Aeneas, which had kept his bed eight years, and was sick of the palsy. And Peter said unto him, Aeneas, Jesus Christ maketh thee whole: arise, and make thy bed. And he arose immediately.

1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Acts 9:33-34:


Paul

From Latin Paulus, from paulus (“small”). Doublet of Pablo and Paolo.

'He will be christened Paul, my - Mrs Dombey - of course.'
She feebly echoed, 'Of course,' or rather expressed it by the motion of her lips, and closed her eyes again.
'His father's name, Mrs Dombey, and his grandfather's! I wish his grandfather were alive this day! There is some inconvenience in the necessity of writing Junior,' said Mr Dombey, making a fictitious autograph on his knee; 'but it is merely of a private and personal complexion. It doesn't enter into the correspondence of the House. Its signature remains the same.'

1846 October 1 – 1848 April 1, Charles Dickens, “Dombey and Son: Chapter 1”, in Dombey and Son, London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1848, →OCLC:

Primarily seen as a publicity vehicle for late-year releases, the awards show and its promoters have lately made pretensions to Oscar oracling: Jamie Foxx won the “breakthrough actor of the year” prize for “Ray” in 2004, after all, and Paul Haggis and his ensemble cast were honored for “Crash” four months before it won best picture.

2006 October 18, David M. Halbfinger, “Hollywood Film Chain’s Latest Link”, in The New York Times:

A male given name from Latin of biblical origin.


Lingua Franca Nova

Coined by Dr. C. George Boeree, the inventor of the language.

A constructed language created by C. George Boeree based on French, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, and Catalan using either Latin or Cyrillic alphabets with grammar based on that of Romance Creoles.


nomen

From Latin nōmen (“name”), a clipping of nōmen gentīle (“family name”). Doublet of name and noun.

Greeks and other provincials who gained Roman citizenship kept their Greek names as cognomens, to which they added Roman nomens and praenomens—usually those of the ones to whom they owed their citizenship.

1990, Richard N. Longenecker, Galatians (Word Biblical Commentary; 41), Zondervan, →ISBN, page 2:

(historical) The family name of an Ancient Roman, designating their gens.


Abkhazian

The Abkhaz language, spoken in Abkhazia, a region in the Caucasus.


Scottish Gaelic

The Gaelic language of Scotland, spoken primarily in the northern and western parts of the country.


Galego

A language spoken in the region of Galicia in the Northwestern corner of the Spanish peninsula and which is related to Portuguese. It is believed to be the parent language of Portuguese and shares many similarities with it, but typically uses Spanish orthography.


Alsatian

Alsatians (plural)
alsatian (alternative)

Even the dogs here are restrained, Jesse thought, unlike the feral Alsatians back home that would sprint barking from the bottom of the garden straight through the house and smash themselves against the inside of the door until their owners appeared and locked them away.

2020, Paul Mendez, Rainbow Milk, Dialogue Books (2021), page 56:

(Australia, New Zealand, British, dated US) A German shepherd dog.


Alsatian

The Germanic lect (language or dialect) spoken in Alsace.


Brithenig

/bɾɪθɛˈniːɡ/

Compare with Breton brezhoneg and Welsh Brythoneg.

An invented language created by Andrew Smith in 1996, based on the premise of Latin being influenced by Old Celtic.


Beeb

Clipping of BBC; possibly popularised by Peter Sellers, who is said to have called the corporation the Beeb Beeb Ceeb on The Goon Show in the 1950s.


Germanic

/d͡ʒɜːˈmæn.ɪk/

Learned borrowing from Latin germānicus.

(linguistics) The early, undocumented ancestral language from which other Germanic languages developed, such as Afrikaans, Danish, Dutch, Frisian, English, German, Faroese, Icelandic, Yiddish, Norwegian and Swedish.

Germaans

early language — see also Proto-Germanic


Germanic

en-adj

Germanic (comparative more Germanic, superlative most Germanic)

more Germanic (comparative)
most Germanic (superlative)

/d͡ʒɜːˈmæn.ɪk/

a Germanic tribe

Relating to the Germanic peoples (such as Germans, Scandinavians or Anglo-Saxons).


White Russian

en-noun

White Russian (countable and uncountable, plural White Russians)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-White Russian.wav

(cocktail): The word white refers to the milk, while Russian refers to the vodka.

Coordinate term: Black Russian

Alternative forms: white Russian, white russian

Few cocktails include milk and cream, so the White Russian is a welcome departure from the norm. Already a popular drink in its own right, the White Russian was made famous by Jeff Bridges’ character in “The Big Lebowski.”

2015, Shane Carley, The Mason Jar Cocktail Companion, Cider Mill Press, →ISBN, page 15:

A cocktail consisting of coffee liqueur, vodka, and milk.

The White Guard colony in Harbin is armed and organized along military lines. At the head of this army of counter-revolution—the shock troops of Japanese imperialism—stands the notorious tsarist bandit, "Ataman" Semionov.

[1935, Leon Dennen, White Guard Terrorists in the U.S.A., New York City: Friends of the Soviet Union, page 18:

(historical) A White Guardist, a Russian who did not support the Socialists in the Revolution in 1917 and the Russian Civil War (1917–1923), and afterwards (e.g. as a White émigré).

белы

White Guardist (Russian Civil War 1917–1923)

(obsolete, uncountable) The Belarusian language.


Devon

From Old English Defenas, which meant both "Devonians" and "Devon," exemplifying the common Anglo-Saxon practice of naming a place after the people who inhabit it.

Any of a number of places in US and Canada.

An unincorporated community in New Castle County, Delaware, United States.

New Castle County
New Castle County#English

An unincorporated community in Mingo County, West Virginia, United States.

"Is that his real name?" I asked, touching the corner of the picture. "Devil?"
"I named him Devon James Jordan, but my oldest―my girl Sheena―she had trouble saying Devon and it came out Devil, and that stuck […]"

2013, Diane Chamberlain, Necessary Lies, Pan Books, →ISBN, page 59:

A male given name transferred from the place name, or a variant of Devin.

A female given name transferred from the place name, of modern American usage.


Nessie

A diminutive of the female given name Agnes.


Zazaki

From Zazaki Zazakî, from Zaza, the name of the people who speak the language.

Zazaki has three sub-dialects: Northern, Central, and Southern Zazaki.

The language spoken by the Zaza people of eastern Turkey.


zee

tlb

(chiefly US, Newfoundland, Philippines, increasingly Canada)

→ Tagalog: zi

1670s US variant of zed (which see for more), by analogy with other letters such as bee, dee, tee and vee, and standardized by Noah Webster.

Thus first C checks to see if ex and wye are equal. The resulting value of 1 or 0 (true or false) then is compared to the value of zee.

1984 Waite, Prata & Martin, C (Computer Program Language), p. 190

The name of the Latin-script letter Z/z.


Claudia

Make ſpede to come befoꝛe winter. Eubolus gretith the / and Pudes / and Linus / and Claudia / and all the bꝛethꝛen.

1526, [William Tyndale, transl.], The Newe Testamẽt […] (Tyndale Bible), [Worms, Germany: Peter Schöffer], →OCLC, 2 Timothy iiij:[21], folio cclxxxij, verso:

Claudia is really Mummy, but she does not like being Mummy so you have to say Claudia. […] Lisa is a better name. Claudia bangs, like the gong in the hall at Sotleigh. Bang – whoom! Lisa makes a nice silky noise, like streams or rain.

1987, Penelope Lively, chapter 4, in Moon Tiger, New York, N.Y.: Grove Press, published 1988, →ISBN, page 45:

A female given name from Latin, masculine equivalent Claudius.


zed

→ Greek: ζεντ (zent)

→ Hindi: ज़ेड (zeḍ)

→ Japanese: ゼット (zetto), ゼッド (zeddo)

→ Korean: 제드 (jedeu)

→ Malay: zed

→ Marathi: जेड (jeḍ)

→ Russian: зэд (zɛd)

→ Thai: แซด (sɛ̂t)

→ Welsh: sèd

From Middle English zed, zedde, zede, from Old French zede, from Late Latin zeta, from Ancient Greek ζῆτα (zêta), from Hebrew ז (zayin) with influence from beta, eta and theta. Letter had rare nonstandard usage in Old English, such as in bezt, where it represented "ts" (compare the German, Italian, and Finnish pronunciation of Z). For the sleep sense, see zzz. The zombie sense comes from the initial letter. Doublet of zeta. Cognate to Spanish zeta, German Zett, French zède, Italian zeta, and perhaps Portuguese zê.

Zzz...With all those ʻzedsʼ I'll be sending you to sleep.

2021, Pat Manser, More Than Words: The Making of the Macquarie Dictionary, Sydney: Macquarie Dictionary, page 298:


Yale

Ultimately borrowed from Welsh Iâl, from iâl (“clearing, cultivated upland”). The surname is habitational. The university is named for Elihu Yale, a notable early benefactor.

But all this still does not rise to the level of a constitutional crisis, according to Jack Balkin, a Yale law professor who has written in depth about the term along with University of Texas professor Sanford Levinson. Democrats in Congress can go to the courts to have their subpoenas enforced, although Balkin said that is not an ideal path.

2019 May 8, Zachary B. Wolf, “How to know when it’s a constitutional crisis”, in CNN:

A university in the eastern United States.

A romanisation scheme originating from Yale University.

A romanisation scheme designed for Mandarin.

Coordinate term: Jyutping

A romanisation scheme designed for Cantonese.

A romanisation scheme designed for Japanese.

A romanisation scheme designed for Korean.

A surname transferred from the place name.


friary

en-adj

friary (comparative more friary, superlative most friary)

more friary (comparative)
most friary (superlative)

From friar (“brother”) in a religious order, from Latin frater (“brother”), from Latin.

Saint Francis with his Friery kowle in a corne-field.

1605, M. N. [pseudonym; William Camden], Remaines of a Greater Worke, Concerning Britaine, […], London: […] G[eorge] E[ld] for Simon Waterson, →OCLC:

Like a friar; relating to friars or to a convent.

mönchisch

like a friar; relating to friars or to a convent


Bosnian

en-noun

Bosnian (countable and uncountable, plural Bosnians)

Bosnia and Herzegovina
Bosnia and Herzegovina

(uncountable) The standardized variety of Serbo-Croatian, a South Slavic language, spoken primarily by Bosniaks in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

gjuha boshnjake

the standardized variety of Serbo-Croatian


Slovakian

A person from Slovakia or of Slovakian descent.


UKIP

UK Independence Party
UK Independence Party#English


UK Independence Party

A Euro-sceptic political party in the United Kingdom.


Abdul

From Arabic عَبْد (ʕabd, “servant [of]”) + ال (al-, “the”).

A male given name from Arabic used by Muslims.


Abdullah

Borrowed from Arabic عَبْدُ ٱللّٰه (ʕabdu llāh, “servant of God”, from عَبْد (ʕabd, “servant”) + اللّٰه (allāh, “God”)).

bor

عَبْدُ ٱللّٰه

Abdulah (alternative)
Abdalah (alternative)
Abdallah (alternative)
Abd Allah (alternative)
Abd' Ulah (alternative)
Abdu'llah (alternative)
Abdulla (alternative)


Abelard

/ˈæb.əˌlɑɹd/

From French Abélard, an extension of the Abel with an Germanic suffix -(h)ard. Possibly also regarded a variant of the German Eberhard "boar" + "hard", equivalent to English Everett.

(rare) A male given name from the Germanic languages.


Abner

From Hebrew אבנר (Abner, “father of light”). From אָב (av, “father”) + נור (nur, “light”).


ess

1998, Ricardo Corona, "These Esses" ("Eses esses"), in Other Shores (Outras Praias), translated by Ricardo Corona & Charles Perrone
these esses / change in design / and senses themselves / $ // it's as if / the ess / were the sounds / of success

I have drunk en-ee-cee-tee-ay-ar from the ef-ell-oh-doubleyou-ee-ar-ess in his gee-ay-ar-dee-ee-en many a time.

2004, Will Rogers, The Stonking Steps, page 170:

The name of the Latin-script letter S/s.


koppa

The 18th Ancient Greek letter in early versions of the Greek alphabet, Ϙ (lowercase ϙ).


Latino sine Flexione

Latino Sine Flexione (alternative)
Latino sine flexione (alternative)

An artificial language based on a simplified version of Latin without inflections; also known as Interlingua


Faroese

/ˌfɛəɹəʊˈiːz/

From Faroe + -ese, from Faroese Føroyar.

Faeroese (alternative)
Færoese (alternative)

Of or pertaining to the Faroe Islands, Faroese people or language.

ֆարերյան

of or pertaining to the Faroe Islands, Faroese people or language


Faroese

/ˌfɛəɹəʊˈiːz/

The language of the Faroe Islands, closely related to Icelandic, and more distantly to Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish.


Faroese

Faroese (plural)
Faeroese (alternative)
Færoese (alternative)

/ˌfɛəɹəʊˈiːz/

(chiefly in the plural) A person from the Faroe Islands; a Faroe Islander.


Texas

Borrowed from Spanish Texas (also Tejas), from Hasinai Caddo táyshaʔ (“friend, ally”), used to refer to the Caddo nation.

Alabama · Alaska · Arizona · Arkansas · California · Colorado · Connecticut · Delaware · Florida · Georgia · Hawaii · Idaho · Illinois · Indiana · Iowa · Kansas · Kentucky · Louisiana · Maine · Maryland · Massachusetts · Michigan · Minnesota · Mississippi · Missouri · Montana · Nebraska · Nevada · New Hampshire · New Jersey · New Mexico · New York · North Carolina · North Dakota · Ohio · Oklahoma · Oregon · Pennsylvania · Rhode Island · South Carolina · South Dakota · Tennessee · Texas · Utah · Vermont · Virginia · Washington · West Virginia · Wisconsin · Wyoming

American Samoa · Guam · Northern Mariana Islands · Puerto Rico · United States minor outlying islands · United States Virgin Islands

(rare) A unisex given name transferred from the place name.


Kashmiri

The Dardic Indo-Aryan language spoken in Kashmir.


Blueshirt

(Ireland, derogatory) A member of Ireland's Fine Gael political party, which O'Duffy's followers joined after their own organization was dissolved.


shinjitai

Transliteration from Japanese 新(しん)字(じ)体(たい) (shinjitai).

Coordinate term: kyūjitai

However, when a traditional “correct” radical has been obscured by the postwar adoption of a simplified form (shinjitai), that radical is simply ignored.

1992, The Journal of the Association of Teachers of Japanese, volume 26, issue 1, page 47:

The simplified form of Japanese kanji used after 1947.


Hannah

en-proper noun

Hannah (countable and uncountable, plural Hannahs)

From previous romanizations of Hebrew חַנָּה (Ḥannâ), chiefly for the mother of Samuel, from חַנָּה (ḥannâ, “grace, gracious, graced with child”). As a Wren with the Royal Marines, after Hannah Snell (1723–1792) who disguised herself as a man to serve in the British military. Doublet of Ann, Anne, Anna, and Ana.

"What about Hannah Schreiber?"
He smiled, flashing some gold in his mouth. "How do you like that name? She was only a girl, but she had an old lady's name. - - -

1959, Philip Roth, Goodbye, Columbus, and Five Short Stories, Houghton Mifflin, published 1959, page 116:

She could buy pretty clothes for a girl and plait her hair with ribbons. And she could call her a nice, old-fashioned, middle-class name like Sarah or Emma or Hannah.

2002, Kate Atkinson, Not the End of the World, Doubleday, →ISBN, page 33:

I wish it were like the movies, the name something silly, CanDee or Bambie, something you could roll your eyes at. Misti with two hearts over the I's. But it's Hannah, which is a real woman, presumably like me.

2012, Gillian Flynn, Gone Girl, Phoenix, published 2013, →ISBN, page 77:


Peter

en-prop

Peter (countable and uncountable, plural Peters)

From Middle English Peter, from Old English Petrus, from Latin Petrus, from Ancient Greek Πέτρος (Pétros), from πέτρος (pétros, “stone, rock”). Doublet of Pedro, Piers, and Boutros.

She knew of no Peter, and yet he was here and there in John and Michael's minds, while Wendy's began to be scrawled all over with him. The name stood out in bolder letters than any of the other words, and as Mrs Darling gazed she felt that it had an oddly cocky appearance.

1911, J. M. Barrie, chapter I, in Peter Pan, Wordsworth Editions Ltd, published 1993:

What splendid names for boys there are! / There's Carol like a rolling car, / And Martin like a flying bird, / And Adam like the Lord's First Word, / And Raymond like the Harvest Moon, / And Peter like a piper's tune,

1933, Eleanor Farjeon, “Boys' Names”, in Over the Garden Wall, Faber and Faber, page 90:

Reps. Seth Moulton, a Democrat from Massachusetts, and Peter Meijer, a Republican from Michigan, said in a joint statement Tuesday that they had traveled to Kabul “to conduct oversight on the mission to evacuate Americans and our allies” and that the trip had been conducted in secret “to minimize the risk and disruption to the people on the ground.”

2021 August 24, Devan Cole, Ryan Nobles, Zachary Cohen and Oren Liebermann, “Two congressmen traveled to Afghanistan amid frantic evacuation efforts”, in CNN:


World War II

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-World War II.wav

As students all over the United States knuckle down to learning, the rumble of war drums once more proclaims Mars high man in Europe. Discarding morbid curiosity, every student should consider it vitally necessary to get a general picture of the causes, movements, and possible effects of World War II. The average U. S. citizen's knowledge of World War II will probably decide his role in it.

1939 November 10, “Following The War”, in The Chart, volume I, number 1, Joplin, Missouri: Joplin Junior College, page 4, column 1:

Nothing since the beginning of World War II, a year ago last September, has boosted British morale or given them greater courage to fight on as has this brilliant Libyan campaign.

1941 March, Frederick M. Barrows, “The War in Africa”, in Command and General Staff School Military Review, volume XXI, number 80, →OCLC, page 23, column 1:

If Demandt's essay served as a strident example of the German desire for normalcy, a more subtle example was provided by a brief allohistorical depiction of a Nazi victory in World War II written by German historian Michael Salewski in 1999.

2005 May 23, Gavriel D. Rosenfeld, The World Hitler Never Made: Alternate History and the Memory of Nazism, Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 182:

The tiny island of Tinian was the launch point for American planes carrying atomic bombs to Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. Now a new runway is being carved from the jungle, just south of World War II ruins inked with mildew.

2023 March 25, Damien Cave, “An Anxious Asia Arms for a War It Hopes to Prevent”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-03-25:

(history) The war from 1939 to 1945 of the Allied forces, including the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, the United States, France, and China, against the Axis Powers, including Germany, Italy, and Japan.

מִלְחֶמֶת הָעוֹלָם הַשְּׁנִיָּה \ מלחמת העולם השנייה

Great Patriotic War

primarily in a Soviet or Russian context


trans

Borrowed from Latin trāns (“on the other side of”). Doublet of très.

bor+

A series of one electron shifts in this complex establish a new trans double bond at carbon ll which transfers the hydrogen to oxygen, forming the hydroperoxide and liberating the enzyme.

1973, Kert F. Ivie, The Effect of Peroxidase on Model Systems of Lipoxidase and Linoleic Acid:

A cis double bond is one where the hydrogen atoms are both on the same side. In contrast, a trans double bond has them on the opposite side.

2015, William P Edwards, The Science of Bakery Products, Royal Society of Chemistry, →ISBN, page 26:

(physical chemistry) In (or constituting, forming, or describing) a double bond in which the greater radical on both ends is on the opposite side of the bond.

The trans effect is the labilization of ligands which are trans to certain other ligands.

coordination compound
coordination compound

(physical chemistry) In (or constituting, forming, or describing) a coordination compound in which the two instances of a particular ligand are on opposite sides of the central atom.


trans

en-verb

trans (third-person singular simple present transes, present participle transing, simple past and past participle transed)

transes (present singular third-person)
transing (participle present)
transed (participle past)
transed (past)

Clipping of transgender or transsexual (ultimately from Latin trāns).

[…] as they interact with bodies transing gender (and other) borders and spaces.

2012, Trystan Cotten, Transgender Migrations: The Bodies, Borders, and Politics of Transition, →ISBN:

Although they did so in sometimes very different ways and in different communities, transsexuals, drag queens, butch lesbians, cross-dressers, feminine men, and masculine women all in some senses crossed, or transed, gender[.] […] People who trans gender as well as people who do not may receive cis-privileges, and people who do not intentionally trans gender as well as people who do are denied cis-privileges if they fail to pass (or pass enough) in the sex/gender they are expected to be.

2012, Finn Enke, Transfeminist Perspectives in and beyond Transgender and Gender Studies, →ISBN, pages 4 and 20:

(transitive, chiefly humorous or social sciences) To cause to cross from one side to another of (gender, sex or similar).