The random etymology of the day

[Annie Subjunctive]

Oh weird - I argued with Taiwanese people before about whether the English word "typhoon" was from Japanese (taifuu) or Chinese (taifeng), but I just tried etymonline and it's telling me it's from Greek via Arabic! They say it may have been influenced by Cantonese or that "that term [the Cantonese] and the Indian one may have had some mutual influence; toofan still means 'big storm' in India."

That all seems really weird to me, though, since the Chinese and Japanese come directly from the characters (platform and wind). They wouldn't have said "let's start pronouncing our word for wind to match that word for storm we got from the Indians/Arabs." Why do they sound so much like all the other languages' terms?

[BlackBlade]

So apparently hobo is a uniquely American word with no known etymology. The unknown etymology is kinda appropriate.

[Jonathon]

The OED says that there are at least two distinct sources:

Two different Oriental words are included here: (1) the α-forms (like Portuguese tufão , †tufõe ) are < Urdu (Persian and Arabic) ṭūfān a violent storm of wind and rain, a tempest, hurricane, tornado, commonly referred to Arabic ṭāfa , to turn round (nouns of action ṭauf , ṭawafān ), but possibly an adoption of Greek τῡϕῶν typhon n.2; (2) the β- and γ- forms represent Chinese tai fung , common dialect forms (as in Cantonese) of ta big, and fêng wind (hence also German teifun ). The spelling of the β-forms has apparently been influenced by that of the earlier-known Indian word, while that now current is due to association with typhon n.2

So it looks like one word went from Urdu to Portuguese to English, and Urdu possibly got it from either Arabic or Greek. The other is just from Cantonese or some similar Chinese dialect.

[BlackBlade]

Why isn't it possible that Persians and Arabs got it from the Chinese a long time ago (We have evidence of commerce between them from like 300AD), and from thence it got passed to English?

[Jonathon]

I didn't say it's not possible, but you have to account for not only sound changes but also its semantics and etymology within the language. Two words that appear superficially similar can be completely unrelated. In this case, though, I don't know enough to speculate beyond what the OED says. Since the Urdu and Chinese forms both have their own separate etymologies and pronunciations, it seems reasonable to assume that the words are unrelated.

[pooka]

Typhon was a figure in Greek mythology, his wife Echidna was "the mother of all monsters".  She must be infinitely disappointed with her zoological namesake. 

[Jonathon]

Sphinx is from the same root as sphincter, which means "to squeeze" and, by extension, "to strangle". The Greek sphinx strangled and devoured those who could not answer its riddles.

[BlackBlade]

Is that also where asphyxiation comes from?

[Jonathon]

Apparently not. It comes from a different root meaning "to throb" and basically means "no pulse" (even though it has come to mean a stoppage of breathing, not a stoppage of the pulse).

[BlackBlade]

Interesting.

[pooka]

disc or disk?  I run into both in anatomy and physiology and I'm wondering if there's any rhyme or reason to it.  I think left to my own devices I would default to disk.

[Jonathon]

I think The Chicago Manual of Style says disc for optical storage devices and disk for everything else, but it seems like a fairly pointless distinction to me. At any rate, it seems to accord with Merriam-Webster.

[rivka]

That's what I was taught as well.

A slipped disc is when someone leaves a DVD on the floor. It hopefully does not result in a slipped disk.

[Jonathon]

Supercilious comes from the Latin noun supercilium, figuratively meaning 'pride' or 'haughtiness' but literally meaning 'eyebrow'. Cilium means 'eyelid', and your eyebrow is above (super) your eyelid. I guess the metaphorical extension comes from raising your eyebrow haughtily at people.

[Annie Subjunctive]

That's a pretty great etymology.

[Dro_Trebor]

Typhon was a figure in Greek mythology, his wife Echidna was "the mother of all monsters".  She must be infinitely disappointed with her zoological namesake. 

Echidna is old Greek for lover of blow hards.
Echidna not!

[Tante Shvester]

Aubergine is an eggplant.  Auberge is French for inn.  Are the eggplants related to the inns?  How so?

[Jonathon]

I'm seeing conflicting information on the etymology of aubergine. It's either a diminutive of auberge, meaning a type of peach, or it was borrowed into French from the Catalan alberginera, which borrowed it from the Arabic al-badinjan, which borrowed it from the Persian badin-gan, which borrowed it from the Sanskrit vatigagama.

The other auberge, meaning 'inn', comes from the Frankish heriberga, which means 'army shelter'. It's not connected to the other auberge—they're just homonyms.

[pooka]

Last night the man said check was backformed from checkmate. 

[Dro_Trebor]

It's true! Back in the olden days, when debtors were trying to duck creditors,they used to have to say "The checkmate is in the mail." The added difficulty of the phrasing led many to be captured and forced to pay. Thus there was much popular pressure to shorten things and get away.

[Jonathon]

Last night the man said check was backformed from checkmate. 

It doesn't look like it's backformed, but it does appear that "all the other senses [of check] seem to have developed from the chess sense." I had no idea.

[BlackBlade]

What about cheque?

edit: Yep, even cheque.

[Tante Shvester]

Probably not Czech, though.  If I married a central European, however, I might have a Czech mate.

[Annie Subjunctive]

Probably not Czech, though.  If I married a central European, however, I might have a Czech mate.

What's-her-name from Hatrack does! (I know her real name, from Facebook, but she's one of the many Jatraqueros whose online identities I've totally forgotten.)

[BlackBlade]

Smithereens as in, "I'll blow your car into smithereens!" comes from Irish apparently.