Case File #014.09.24: RIBALD

We English speakers in the twenty-first century commonly use the word ribald as an adjective meaning “amusingly and irreverently vulgar or lewd,” but believe it or not, linguists and etymologists trace the word back to the Proto-Indo-European verb root wreip- (sometimes transliterated as wrip-), which meant “to turn.” From that, they say, came the Proto-Germanic verb wribanan, meaning “to bend,” and this in turn passed into Old High German as riban, which literally meant “to rub” but eventually became a euphemism for the sex act and was therefore often used to mean “to be licentious or lascivious.” Speakers of Old French borrowed the Old High German verb but changed its form to riber, and from this they derived the noun ribalt (sometimes spelled ribaut) and used it to mean one of two things: “a licentious or lascivious person” or, more generally, “a rogue or scoundrel.” When English speakers borrowed the Old French noun in the early thirteenth century, they Anglicized it to ribaude (sometimes spelling it ribaud or ribalde) and dropped the sexual associations, thus using it to mean only “a scoundrel or an otherwise worthless person.” During the fifteenth century, however, the English noun began to take on some sexual connotations of its own, and by around 1500, the word's form had changed to the current ribald and it was being used to mean “an irreverently wanton or lewd person.” Not long after, ribald also more or less took on its contemporary adjective sense—Scottish poet William Dunbar gets the credit for the coining, as the adjective apparently first appeared in print when Chepman and Myllar Press (aka Southgait Press), Scotland's first commercial printer, published some of the poet's work in 1508—and by the time the twentieth century rolled around, the adjective was showing up in everyday usage much more frequently than the noun. In fact, though the noun sense still appears in most contemporary dictionaries, few of today's English speakers are aware that it exists and even fewer use it.

©2014 Michael R. Gates

Case File #014.09.10: ARDENT

If you have an ardent interest in some item or another, it means you are burning with enthusiasm or ablaze with passion for the thing in question. It should come as no surprise, then, that the adjective ardent has a fiery family tree. Indeed, its earliest ancestor is the Latin verb ardere, which meant “to burn.” From the verb came the Latin adjective ardentem, meaning “burning or ablaze,” and this eventually passed into Old French as ardant. English speakers borrowed the Old French (sometimes spelling it ardaunt) circa 1335, but in the early fifteenth century, the English word's form changed to the now familiar ardent and, the occasional poetic throwback notwithstanding, its meaning shifted from “burning” to the current and more figurative “enthusiastic, fervent, or passionate.”

©2014 Michael R. Gates

Case File #014.08.20: NOOSE

Although the English noun noose means “a loop in a rope or cord, specifically one formed by means of a slipknot so that it can be made to shrink and bind tightly around something when one end of the rope or cord is pulled,” the word's family tree is more firmly rooted in the notion of the knot than it is in that of the loop. You see, the noun's oldest ancestor is the Latin noun nodus, which meant “knot” or “node.” The Latin passed into Old Provençal (aka Old Occitan) and, in turn, Old French as nous or nos, and in the early fifteenth century, English speakers borrowed the Old French, Anglicized it to nose, and used it to mean “slipknot.” It took about half the century, however, for the word's meaning to shift to something like “the loop formed by a slipknot in a rope or cord,” and it wasn't until the end of the century, when Middle English started giving way to modern English, that the spelling changed to the contemporary noose and the noun began to take on the more specific denotation of a loop that tightly binds or snares. Around 1600, noose also took on two verb senses, “to capture or secure by or as if by a noose” and “to make a noose of or in,” but here in the twenty-first century, the verbs aren't used as commonly as they once were.

©2014 Michael R. Gates

Case File #014.08.06: CABAL

Contrary to tradition and popular belief, the noun cabal did not originate as a seventeenth-century political acronym. While it's true that the five nefarious noblemen—that is, Clifford, Arlington, Buckingham, Ashley-Cooper, and Lauderdale—who comprised the Privy Council of Britain's Charles II were often referred to collectively as the Cabal (or sometimes as the Cabal Ministry), the word was neither coined specifically for them nor formed from the initial letters of their names. (That these letters can be used to spell cabal is mere coincidence, though one that has likely fueled the acronym myth.) The noun cabal actually entered the English lexicon in the early sixteenth century, about 100 years or so before Charles II or the members of his Privy Council were born, only back then its meaning had little, if any, connection with conspiracy or intrigue. In fact, the word originally meant “a Jewish or otherwise arcane interpretation of the Old Testament,” and this isn't too surprising when you consider that its roots wind all the way back to the post-Biblical Hebrew word qabbalah (often transliterated as kabbalah), which itself means “a received or traditional Jewish method for mystically interpreting the Hebrew scriptures.” Medieval Latin borrowed the Hebrew to form the word cabballa, and this subsequently passed into French as cabale. Around 1530, English borrowed the French but Anglicized it to cabal, and it was about a century or so later, when Charles II and his future advisers were still in diapers, that both the English word and its French cognate lost their association with religious arcana and came to mean “a private group or clique, especially one that meets for purposes of conspiracy or political intrigue” and “a secret scheme or plot.”

©2014 Michael R. Gates

Case File #014.07.16: GROG

Originally meaning “rum mixed with water,” grog first entered the English lexicon in the mid-eighteenth century as an allusion to Edward Vernon, a noted British admiral who had the nickname Old Grog due to his habit of wearing a cloak made of grogram. (Grogram is a course, stiff fabric made of silk or a blend of silk and mohair or silk and wool.) In 1740, the stern skinflint Vernon ordered that his sailors' rum rations be cut with water, and it didn't take long for the incensed sailors to christen the diluted rum with the nickname of their malefactor. By the end of the eighteenth century, however, grog had come to mean “any liquor that has been diluted with water,” and in the early twentieth century, the word came to be used as an informal reference to any cheap alcoholic drink, especially beer. Around 1830, the noun grog begat the adjective groggy, which, not surprisingly, at first meant “drunk or intoxicated,” though it is now used more broadly to mean “dazed, weak, or unsteady, especially when due to intoxication, illness, or lack of sleep.”

©2014 Michael R. Gates

Case File #014.07.09: JOY

The noun joy has its roots in the Latin verb gaudere, which was used to mean both “to be happy” and “to rejoice.” From the Latin verb came the noun gaudium, meaning “delight” or “something that causes delight,” and its plural gaudia, and gaudia later passed into Old French as joie, which meant “a feeling of intense pleasure or happiness, or an instance of such a feeling” and “a source of great pleasure or happiness.” Around 1200, Middle English speakers borrowed the Old French noun but quickly Anglicized its form to the now familiar joy, and not long after, the English word also acquired two verb senses: “to experience great pleasure” and “to take delight in (something).” The verb, however, eventually fell out of favor with everybody except poets, and only the noun senses of joy remain in common use today.

©2014 Michael R. Gates

Case File #014.07.02: OPPORTUNE

While we in the twenty-first century might not think of opportune as a seafaring word, the fact is that it kind of started out as one. You see, back in the days of ancient Rome, long before the invention of our more reliable modern seagoing vessels and global-positioning technology and the like, taking a sea voyage was much riskier and more dangerous than it is now. Thus, Roman sailors viewed the harbor as a safe haven and considered the moments when they sailed into port as happy and favorable ones, and it should come as no surprise, then, that the Latin phrase ob portum, which meant “toward a port,” became an idiom meaning “advantageous conditions” or “propitious circumstances.” Over time, the idiomatic phrase evolved into the Latin adjective opportunus, which was used to mean both “apt or suitable” and “favorable,” and this passed into Old French as opportun. English speakers borrowed the Old French around the end of the fourteenth century, Anglicizing the word's form to opportune and refining its primary meaning to “suitable or appropriate for a particular purpose” and its secondary to “occurring at a useful or advantageous time.”

©2014 Michael R. Gates