The Romance of Words (Part 2)

I mentioned that I've been reading The Romance of Words I've now finished it, so I figured I would list the many other words that I found that piqued my interest. Here's the ones found in pp. 37-60:

• magenta (p.37):
  

  Some elderly people can still remember ladies wearing a garibaldi. To the same period belongs the colour magenta, from the victory of the French over the Austrians at Magenta in 1859.

• Nicotine (p.37):
  

  Nicotine is named from Jean Nicot, French ambassador at Lisbon, who sent some tobacco-plants to Catherine de Médicis in 1560. He also compiled the first Old French dictionary.

• boycott (p.38):
  

  Burke and boycott commemorate a scoundrel and a victim. The latter word, from the treatment of Captain Boycott and Co. Mayo in 1880, seems to have supplied a want, for Fr. boycotter and Ger. boycottieren have become familiar words.

• jacket (p. 40):
  

  A coat of mail was called in English a jack and in French jaque, "a jack, or coat of maile" (Cotgrave); hence the diminutive jacket.

• zany (p. 41):
  

  Zany, formerly a conjuror's assistant, is Zanni (see p. 114), and Italian diminutive of Giovanni, John.

  One of my friends named John fits the modern meaning perfectly.
• dunce (p. 41):
  

  Dunce is a libel on the disciples of the great medieval schoolman John Duns Scotus, born at Duns in Berwickshire.

  Despite the libel, he was quite brilliant.
• dollar (p. 44):
  

  The dollar is the Low Ger. daler, for Ger. taler, originally called a Joachimstaler, from the silver-mine of Joachimstal, "Joachim's dale," in Bohemia. Cotgrave registers a curious Okd French perversion jocandale, "a daller, a piece of money worth about 3s. sterl."

• peach (p. 44):
  

  Some fruits may also be mentioned, e.g., the damson from Damascus, through Old Fr. damaisine, "a damascene or damsen plum" (Cotgrave), the currant from Corinth and the peach, Fr. pêche, from Vulgar Lat., pessica, for Persica.

• polka (p. 44):
  

  Other "local" dances are the polka, which means Polish woman, mazurka, woman of Mazuria, and the obsolete polonaise, lit. Polish, cracovienne, from Cracow, and varsovienne, from Warsaw.

• tarantula (p. 44-45):
  

  The tarantella, like the tarantula spider, takes its name from Taranto, in Italy. The tune of the dance is said to have been originally employed as a cure for the lethargy caused by the bite of the spider. Florio has tarantola, "a serpent called an eft or an evet. Some take it to be a flye whose sting is perillous and deadly, and nothing but divers sounds of musicke can cure the patient."

• troy (p. 45):
  

  The town of Troyes has given its name to troy weight.

• lateen (p. 45):
  

  An argosy, formerly also ragusye, was named from the Adriatic port of Ragusa, and a lateen sail is a Latin, i.e., Mediterranean, sail...

• guinea-pig (p. 46):
  

  The guinea-fowl and guinea gold came fist from the west coast of Africa, but the guinea-pig is a native of Brazil. the name probably came from the Guinea-mean, or slave-ships, which regularly followed a triangular course. They sailed outward to the west coast of Africa with English goods. These they exchanged for slaves, whom they transported to the West Indies, the horrible "middle passage," and finally they sailed homeward with the new World produce, including, no doubt, guinea-pigs brought home by sailors. the turkey is also called guinea-fowl in the 17th century, probably to be explained in the same way. the German name for the guinea-pig, meerschweinchen, seems to mean little pig form over the sea.

• h-artificial (p. 48):
  

  The "educated" h- of modern English is largely an artificial restoration; cf. the modern hotel-keeper with the older word ostler (see p. 130), or the family name Armitage with the restored hermitage.

• ampersand (p. 49):
  

  The m of the curious word ampersand, variously spelt, is due to the neighbouring p. It is applied to the sign &. I thought it obsolete till I cam across it on successive days in two contemporary writers--

  "One of my mother's chief cares was to teach me my letters, which I learnt from big A to Ampersand in the old hornbook at Lantrig." (Quiller-Couch, Dead Man's Rock, Ch. 2)

  "Tommy knew all about the work, Knew every letter in it from A to Emperzan. (Pett Ridge, In the Wars.)

  Children used to repeat the alphabet thus--"A per se A, B per se B," and so on to "and per se and." The symbol & is an abbreviation of Lat. et, written ___

  (I couldn't find the character in Unicode :-( Basically it's the fancy style of &, like as seen here).
• mob and pun (p. 57):
  

  This method of shortening words was very popular in the 17th century, from which period date cit(izen), mob(ile vulgus), the fickle crowd, and pun(digrion). We often find the fuller mobile used for mob. The origin of pundigrion is uncertain. It may be an illiterate attempt at Ital. puntiglio, which, like Fr. pointe, was used of a verbal quibble or fine distinction.

  I knew about mob, but not about pun.
• whiskey (p. 58):
  

  We have navvy for navigator, brandy for brandywine, from Du. brandewyn, lit. burn wine, and whisky for usquebaugh, Gaelic uisge-beatha, water of life (cf. eau-de-vie), so that the literal meaning of whisky is very innocent. It has a doublet in the river-name Usk. Before the 18th century usquebaugh was the regular form.

• daffodil (p. 60):
  

  Cotgrave has asphodile (asphodèle), "the daffodil, affodill, or asphodill, flower." The playful elaboration daffadowndilly is as old as Spenser.

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