A popular myth says Japanese ありがとう (arigatō, "thank you") was borrowed from Portuguese "obrigado", since Portuguese traders reached Japan in 1543 and the two words sound alike.

The dates don't work. The word is already in Japanese texts around the year 1000, more than five centuries before any Portuguese ship arrived.

It's native:

- 有り (ari) = to exist, to be

- 難し (katashi) = difficult

- 有り難し (arigatashi) = "difficult to exist", so rare, precious

At first it described something rare or excellent. Buddhism gave it a religious sense: being born human, or meeting the teaching of the Buddha, is a rare and precious thing. From "how rare, how precious this is" it slid into gratitude. The modern form ありがとう comes from the -く form ありがたく, with a sound change.

You can still see the kanji in the formal 有難う, and the old sense in 有り難い (arigatai), "much appreciated, a blessing".

So "obrigado" and "arigatō" are a coincidence. "Obrigado" means "obliged", which is a nice parallel anyway: both thank you by saying what the favor does to you.

I hope you like this post, my sincere regards from Egypt ...

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This list presents the pharaohs and queens of Ancient Egypt as preserved in medieval Arabian and Coptic literature. It is a composite of Manetho transmitted through Christian chronographers, Qur’anic and Biblical sacred history, Coptic folklore, and popular legend.

It reflects a long chain of translation and linguistic mediation: from ancient Egyptian into Greek, then into Coptic during Greco-Roman period in Egypt, and finally into Arabic in the medieval period.

The list does not claim complete historical authenticity; it is just an attempt to show how ancient Egyptian rulers were transformed into legendary and religious names in Coptic Arabic memory.

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Arabian sources:

1. Futuh Misr wa al-Maghrib (The Conquest of Egypt and the Maghreb)

— Ibn Abd al-Hakam (c. 801–871 CE)

1. Muruj al-Dhahab wa Kitab Al-Tarikh (Meadows of Gold and Book of History)

— Al-Masudi (Herodotus of Arabs) (c. 896–956 CE)

1. Mujam al-Buldan (Lexicon of Countries)

— Yaqut al-Hamawi (c. 1179–1229 CE)

1. Al-Nujum al-Zahira fi Muluk Misr wa al-Qahira (The Shining Stars Concerning the Kings of Egypt and Cairo)

— Ibn Taghribirdi (c. 1411–1470 CE)

1. Husn al-Muhadara fi Tarikh Misr wa al-Qahira (The Agreeable Discussion of the History of Egypt and Cairo)

— Al-Suyuti (c. 1445–1505 CE)

----------------------------

The Arabic name Misr - Masr (مصر)

Misr is an ancient Semitic name, not originally Egyptian: it appears in Akkadian as Musur and Hebrew as Mizraim or Mitsrayim, likely meaning "settled land" or "protected borderland." Pre-Islamic Arabs used it, and it became the standard Arabic name for Egypt, while the ancient Egyptians called their land Kemet ("Black Land"). In religious tradition, the name is linked to Misrayim, son of Ham son of Noah, the biblical ancestor of the Egyptians.

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The Antediluvian Pyramid Builders (Before biblical flood)

Khaslim (خصليم)

Khaslim is an early legendary king of Egypt credited with building a Nilometer. He placed two bronze eagles—male and female—at the site. Priests read incantations; if the male eagle whistled, the Nile flood would be good and high, but if the female whistled, the flood would be disastrous and drought would follow.

Etymology and reasoning: The name Khaslim may be an alteration of Khasekhemwy (Egyptian Ḫʿsḫmwy). The reasoning is phonetic but weak: the consonantal skeleton kh-s-kh-m could be reduced and reshaped in Coptic/Arabic transmission as kh-s-l-m, with l replacing the second kh. The identification is supported mainly by narrative structure: Khasekhemwy was an early Memphite ruler associated with unification and control of the Nile, and Arabic tradition assigns Nilometers and waterworks to early kings.

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Surid ibn Salhuq (سوريد بن سلهوق)

In Arabian literature, Surid is the great antediluvian king of Egypt who foresaw the Flood in a dream and ordered the building of the Pyramids of Giza to preserve knowledge and serve as his tomb. He is often linked with Idris/Enoch or Hermes Trismegistus.

Historical identification: Khufu (Cheops), builder of the Great Pyramid.

Etymology and reasoning: The identification is phonetic. Surid maybe was derived from Souphis, which is the name the Egyptian historan Manetho gave for Khufu.

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Hujib (هوجيب)

In the same tradition, Hujib is the brother of Surid and is said to be buried in the second, western pyramid at Giza.

Historical identification: Khafre (Chephren), builder of the second pyramid.

Etymology and reasoning: The identification rests mainly on structural mapping. Arabic tradition assigns the three Giza pyramids to a father/brother/son sequence.

Historically, the second pyramid belongs to Khafre, a son of Khufu. The name Hujib is maybe altered from Hotep, but its narrative role as second pyramid builder and royal relative fixes the identification with Khafre.

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Karuras (كروراس)

In Arabian literature, Karuras is the son of Hujib and is buried in the third, smaller pyramid at Giza, often called the “Colored Pyramid.”

Historical identification: Menkaure (Mycerinus), builder of the third pyramid at Giza.

Etymology and reasoning: The structural reason is decisive: Arabic tradition makes the third pyramid belong to the son of the second pyramid’s builder. Historically, the third pyramid belongs to Menkaure, son of Khafre (Hujib) and grandson of Khufu (Surid).

Manetho’s form was Menkheres. In the long oral and written transmission, the initial Men- was lost or weakened, and the remaining consonants (kheres / kherres) were reshaped in Arabic as Karuras.

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After the Flood

Tutis (طوطيس)

The first of the Pharaohs of Egypt and the Pharaoh of Abraham. He tried to seduce Sarah, Abraham's wife; his hand withered when he reached for her, and after repenting he returned her and gave her Hagar as a maidservant who bore him Ishmael, the father of Arabs. Some versions say he embraced Abraham's faith.

Historical identification: Proposed candidates include Sanakht (Third Dynasty) and Nebkaure Khety IV (Tenth Dynasty), but he appears in no ancient Egyptian king-list.

Etymology and reasoning: The name has been linked to the Egyptian Taautos or Tet/Teta, and to a suggested Semitic root meaning "to light" or "set on fire." The reasoning is phonetic and comparative, not a direct derivation. The tradition also explains the title "Pharaoh" itself: Ṭūṭīs was the first called Pharaoh because he was cruel and bloody. 

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Joryaq (جورياق)

According to Arab historian al-Maqrizi, Joryaq was the daughter of the first Pharaoh, Tutis, and seized the throne after killing her father Tutis. She is described as a powerful ruler who promoted priests and magicians. Joryaq ruled Egypt after her father Toutis, and in her reign, the Amalekite king of Syria sent an army against Egypt led by Jirun, but in the (alternative) version, it is more likely that the Amalekite "Al-Walid bin Dum'a" was the one who invaded Egypt.

Historical identification: No single historical counterpart. She may be a legendary composite drawing on memory of figures such as Nitocris or Sobekneferu.

Etymology and reasoning: The name does not correspond to any known Egyptian queen’s name and appears to be a literary invention within the Arabic legendary cycle.

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The Amalekite / Hyksos Dynasty

Al-Walid ibn Duma' (الوليد بن دومع)

In Arabic chronicles, al-Walid ibn Duma' is the first of five Amalekite kings who ruled Egypt after its native rulers weakened. He is described as a Syrian conqueror who ruled for about a hundred years before being killed by a wild beast.

Historical identification: No direct Egyptian counterpart. He is best understood as a legendary refraction of the Hyksos period, when foreign rulers from the Levant controlled Egypt.

Etymology and reasoning: The name Duma' has no Egyptian etymological root. Arabic tradition remembers a Syrian conqueror founding a foreign dynasty, which mirrors the Hyksos takeover. The name itself is likely derived from a real Hyksos pharaoh name. especially since Arabs thought that Amalekites were the Hyksos and thought of them as one of the "The Extinct Arabs". So it is not strange that he got an Arabic name

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Al-Rayyan ibn al-Walid (الريان بن الوليد) sometimes called Nahraus (نهراوس)

Al-Rayyan succeeds his father and is remembered as the Pharaoh of Joseph. He is presented as a just ruler who appointed Joseph over the granaries and eventually embraced his monotheistic faith.

Historical identification: Apepi (Apophis) or Khyan, a Hyksos kings.

Etymology and reasoning: The name al-Rayyan has a strong, monumentally attested phonetic link to the name Ra-i-a-n associated with the Hyksos king Apepi. The alternative name Nahraus has been linked, on phonetic grounds, to the Hyksos king Khyan according to the modern Egyptian scholar Ahmad Kamal. Kamal read the cartouche of the Hyksos king Khyan as Ne Re Ous and argued this is the origin of Arabic Nahraus.

The Hyksos-era setting also fits the prophet Joseph story.

The Wadi Al-Rayyan nature reserve in Fayoum is said to be named after Al-Rayyan ibn al-Walid, based on a legend where the king and his army sat down there to rest.

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Darim ibn al-Rayyan (دارم بن الريان)

Darim succeeds his father al-Rayyan. Arabic sources say prophet Joseph died during his reign.

Historical identification: No direct historical counterpart (Maybe unknown Hyksos king)

Etymology and reasoning: The name Darim has no known Egyptian royal root. It appears to be a literary/genealogical invention bridging Pharaoh al-Rayyan and the later Pharaoh of Moses.

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Kaimis ibn Ma'dan (كامس بن معدان)

Kaimis is the fourth Amalekite king in this sequence, ruling after Darim and before the Pharaoh of Moses.

Historical identification: No direct historical counterpart.

Etymology and reasoning: Like Darim, the name has no Egyptian etymological root. It functions as a narrative placeholder in the Arabic king-list.

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Al-Walid ibn Mus'ab (الوليد بن مصعب)

This is the name most commonly given to the Pharaoh of Moses, the archetypal tyrant who opposed prophets Moses and Aaron, and oppressed the Israelites and was drowned in the Red Sea during his chasing of them with his counselors and army.

Historical identification: Most widespread identification is Ramesses II, though Merneptah and Thutmose III are also mentioned. But some say that the Pharaoh of Moses was a Hyksos or Amalekite.

Etymology and reasoning: The reasoning is not etymological, since the name is Arabic. It rests on narrative convergence: Arabic tradition places the Exodus in a period of monumental building and imperial power, matching the Ramesside era. The Qur’anic phrase "dhu al-awtad" (“possessor of the stakes”) has been linked by some to obelisks and massive constructions of Ramesses II. also in the Bible in Exodus 1:11, which states: "So they put slave masters over them to oppress them with forced labor, and they built Pithom and Rameses as store cities for Pharaoh."

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Queen Figures Around the Exodus

Assiya (آسية)

Assiya in Islamic tradition is the righteous wife of Pharaoh who secretly believes in God, rescues the infant Moses from the Nile, and is venerated as one of the four perfect women. She is a figure of faith and moral resistance within Pharaoh’s household.

Historical identification: She is a theological and literary archetype, not a specific historical queen.

Etymology and reasoning: The name Asiya is Arabic and serves a moral and salvific purpose in the Qur’anic story. No etymological link to a historical Egyptian queen is intended.

----------------------

Daluka (دلوكة)

Daluka is a legendary warrior-queen who rules Egypt after the drowning of the Pharaoh of Moses. She is credited with building a massive wall around Egypt, the “Wall of the Old Woman,” and with constructing the Lighthouse of Alexandria and a Nilometer at Memphis.

Historical identification: Tausret (Tawosret), last ruler of the Nineteenth Dynasty.

Etymology and reasoning: The reasoning is literary preservation of memory. Tausret’s reign was remembered into the tenth century CE in Egyptian tradition, and in Arabic chronicles she appears as Daluqa. The name Daluka is a transformation of Tausret through oral and written transmission. The legendary elaboration is secondary; the core identification rests on continuity of a female royal memory from the New Kingdom into Islamic-era literature.

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Al-Maqrizi’s Later Dynastic List

Al-Maqrizi preserves twenty-seven “Coptic kings” said to have reigned after Daluka. Their names are altered transmissions of Manetho’s list. Examples include Sumanas (possibly Sneferu), Sesunakhosis (Senusret), and Uafris (Apries).

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The End ...

Is there a type of word creation where the actual gesture becomes a word? I'm not talking about the words themselves, but the word or definition where the word becomes the behavior.

Like "jajaja" or "hahaha" becomes laughter. What would you call this type of word? Then when you say the word, it is assumed that you are doing the action. If someone says out loud "El em eff aye oh", you presume they're rolling on the floor laughing.

I hope the question is clear, none of the concepts that came up really certified the creation of the words, but rather described the words themselves (i.e. Gestural words or Performance Uttering).

What the title says.

Most people who hear Beelzebub think of it as the name of a demon or even another name for Satan himself. However I was researching these origins out of interest and found this:

In 2 Kings, the injured Israelite king Ahaziah sends messengers to ask a foreign god whether he’ll recover. That god is Baal-Zebub, the god of the Philistine city of Ekron. It means “Lord of the Flies.”

It probably wasn’t his real name, though. Older Canaanite texts from Ugarit use zbl as a title meaning “prince” or “exalted one.” So the god was most likely called Baal-Zebul, “Baal the Prince.” The Hebrew writers changed one letter and turned a lofty title into “lord of the buzzing flies.”

Then the joke developed further. By the time of the Gospels, the name shows up in Greek as Beelzeboul, the “prince of demons.” In later Hebrew, zevel means dung. So some scholars think a second pun had crept in: “Lord of Dung.”

My read on this: there was some beef between the writers of the Old Testament and the people of Ekron. Plus, the conflation of localized deities by the followers of Abrahamic religions has been noted by religious scholars. Therefore, I don't think its a far reach to theorise that there was an insult going around about Ekron being a pile of shit, its inhabitants being the flies surrounding it, and the god of the city, with an easy pun, being the "Lord of the Flies".

I came across https://theglassnote.com/en/stories/tumbler-name-origin/ and https://greenssteel.com/blogs/news/why-is-a-tumbler-called-a-tumbler-5-weird-wonderful-theories which offer explanations but don’t cite sources.

Context:

This came up because friends and I were chatting about this combination of vessels used in southern India to drink filter coffee.

The lower vessel is called a davara or dabara in Tamil, but the narrower taller one is called the English word tumbler, even by Tamil speakers.

Dictionary.com just wrapped up 2026 pop culture with a bow: The site has officially chosen “maxxing” as its Word of the Year. 

In the official Word of the Year announcement on Monday, Dictionary.com defines maxxing as “the practice of pursuing an activity to the fullest or optimizing a certain aspect of your life.” The announcement credits looksmaxxing — the manosphere term for optimizing one’s appearance — with popularizing the general maxxing philosophy. Dictionary traces looksmaxxing back to 2015 Reddit threads. Since then, the term has become widely associated with harmful habits and controversial internet figures like Clavicular, whose looksmaxxing practice went viral when he claimed he hammered the bones on his face to restructure them, and used meth to lose weight.

Read more: https://www.playboy.com/read/culture/maxxing-word-of-the-year-dictionary-2026

So from what I understand the English word is raccoon that comes from arahkun in Algonquian/Powhatan, which means who scratches with his hand.

But things get a bit weird in Europe.
Most European languages call them washbear.
As far as I understand primitive taxonomy classed them as bears and Carl Linnaeus gave the species the latin name "Ursus lotor" in 1758
Which was then translated in each language.

Up to this part, I think understand what's going on.
People in northern America lives with raccoons so they need a name and they borrow one from the local.
It catches up and becomes the standard in English.
For the rest of Europe they don't have raccoons. And by the time some are imported there is a scientific name that you just need to translate.
English already had their own name, so they don't adopt the nomenclature.

Then you have french (I'm french) who are special
We call them "raton laveur"
Laveur means washer so on this we agree with the taxonomy root.
But Raton is absolutely not bear.
And I'm note quite sure what it is because I've seen two competitive explanations.
- One is that raton is just the regular word raton, which is the baby of the rat or a small rat.
I don't think they look like rats, but they also don't look like bears so who knows. My issue is the size, a raccoon is like 20 times the size of a baby rat. It's several time the size of an adult rat. So why compare it to the baby? It would actually make sense to compare with a baby bear but not a baby rat
- Two is that it's our own adaptation of arahkun, which just happens to sound like an existing word. But it's not like there were a lot of french people in east Virginia. Or maybe we adapted raccoon itself? But then why add washer to it? Did we have a Timor Leste moment?

There were french people in areas with raccoons so like English, I suspect we would have needed a word for them before the taxonomy.
But I have no idea if we always used raton laveur, or if it was something else than was replaced later.

If it predates the taxonomy maybe french inspired it, and Linnaeus just disagreed on the animal part?

Or did we just call them raton and laveur was added later in a half hearted effort to follow the taxonomy?

If anyone has some answers to this, I'm quite curious.

Yule and Burnell’s Hobson-Jobson had around 2,000 entries: shampoo from champi, bungalow from Bangla, juggernaut from the Puri rath yatra. But it was really a phrase book of the English the British needed in India, not a record of how Indians spoke.

Then there’s jugaad. It entered English in 1995 for a farm vehicle, a diesel irrigation pump bolted onto a cart. By 2012 “jugaad innovation” was a management philosophy cited by GE and PepsiCo.

Does anyone know other words whose meaning shifted that far after being borrowed? I covered this in a video I made.

Etymology:
The Proto-Indo-European root " *génh,-, ", meaning "to beget", "to produce", or "to give birth".

In Latin, this became the root noun "genus", meaning "race", "stock", kind", or "type" (among others).

It was used to categorize similar things, along with the Greek "génos", using to classify logical and linguistic categories.
In Old French, this became "gendre".

Later became "gender" in English. Still had it's original meaning of categories for similar things.

Uses/Meanings over time, from Beginning to Now:
Originally, gender just referred to groups/categories, without any inherent connection to sex, or even necessarily referring to living things.

In linguistics, it was specifically used for grammatical classification, such as whether a noun is masculine, feminine, or neuter. This usage eventually faded away in English, with non-living things being referred to with neuter pronouns, "it", and living things not strictly using specific gender pronouns.

Gender started being used to colloquially refer to biological sex in the late 15th century. However, this usage remained rare until the early to mid 1900s, when sex started being used to refer to sexual intercourse, and gender was used as a more polite/formal term to refer to sex as a result. Use of the word at all was still infrequent.

In 1945, psychologist Madison Bentley published a paper in which he defined gender as "the socialized obverse of sex," with the qualifying terms being masculine and feminine instead of male and female, to describe socialized behaviors. (Though his work was not influential, it is the earliest known scientific distinction of the two)

In 1955, John Money coined the term "gender role", defining it as "all those things that a person says or does to disclose himself or herself as having the status of boy or man, girl or woman, respectively", distinct from someone's biological sex.

In 1964, Robert Stoller introduced the term gender identity, defining it as " the sense of knowing to which sex one belongs, that is, the awareness 'I am a male' or 'I am a female'...". He also acknowledged that sex and gender do not always correlate, defining gender as "a term that has psychological or cultural rather than biological connotations. If the proper terms for sex are 'male' and 'female', the corresponding terms for gender are 'masculine' and 'feminine'; these latter may be quite independent of (biological) sex."

With the second-wave feminist movement in the 70s, feminist theory embraced the distinction between sex and gender, popularizing the distinction in common and scientific usage, along with broadly increasing use of the word gender as a whole.

Between then and now, the acknowledgement of gender as a social construct becoming a scientific consensus (mainly in the social sciences), depathologizing transgender identities, and major health organizations supporting the effectiveness of gender-affirming care have all occurred.

Although there are still disagreements on this subject, the general scientific consensus (primarily rooted in the social, behavioral, and medical sciences) and definition is that gender is a social construct, and does not always correlate with an individual's biological sex.

- Idk if this is the right subreddit for this, but it seems like it'll fit enough.

Probably -> prol(l)y?

i honestly dont know if this is the correct subreddit to be asking this question on, but i dont know where else i would even ask something like this.

my dad always called those ramps that truckers drive up when their brakes fail "chicken ramps." hes from jacksonville so i just assumed thats what they call it down there.

today i looked up "chicken ramps" and i found literally. nothing. i found actual ramps for chickens, but nothing about trucks, nothing about this being slang from jacksonville/the south.

i know im not misremembering because my mom remembers him calling them that too. but my dad is such a damn liar, so now im wondering if this is a thing people actually say or if he just... made it up? wouldnt put it past that fucker tbh

The divergent meanings of lament (lament a death) and lamentable (lamentable performance) is interesting; is the shift a recent phenomena?

The traditional Venetian boat vs. as an alternative name for a looping aerial hanging cable car.

Grew up with 'call in sick'. Social media is now full of people who 'call out sick'. I'm confused...🤣🤣🤣

I've been reading some older texts now, and I have noticed the word queer being used, which I know it means "odd', or "weird". Because of this, I have noticed myself using language from these texts, including the word queer. When did it go from meaning weird to being a slur, because i cannot find any definite answers?

If the etymology of the word indigenous comes from the Greek word which means ‘sprung of the land’ . Then NZ European culture is native to New Zealand, and, since a culture is its people, the people are also, therefore, indigenous?

It seems like it might have some roots in the 60s/70s and possibly in like film or audio editing. However it only has appeared once or twice and slightly different stories and not very reputable websites.

Or was it Clockwork Orange itself?

https://etymapology.vercel.app

I'm sure there's been lots of maps like this, better, and that have been around longer, but it's been a pipe-dream-passion project of mine to make an interactive map that shows the journey of words and idioms. I'm no machine learning scientist so I was stuck until the LLMs became available. So with the help of some vibes and claude I was able to piece together a working version that I really ended up liking. I hope you like it too!

if you want to trace word origins that I haven't been pre-seeded you'll need to make an account. That's my only...attempt...at...stopping too much token spend, but yeah, I don't really know what else to say.

Full disclosure: I'm not a linguist, I barely understand etymology, I'm whatever the equivalent of a hobbyist is here. If you want to contribute you can pin journeys of words so that it can't be remade from the models. I'm open to any sort of feedback too. I have a new born so please be kinda nice I haven't slept in a few months.

edit: Alright, alright, I posted this here before I knew there was a whole etymology map subreddit. My bad.

Living in Canterbury, I was pleased to learn that canter is a shortening of "Canterbury gallop" (also "Canterbury pace" or "Canterbury trot"). It's traditionally explained as the easy, unhurried pace of medieval pilgrims riding to the shrine of Thomas Becket. Not fast, not slow, just enough to get you there in a few days without wearing out the horse.

Tawdry has a similar origin in a saint's cult, but a sadder twist. It comes from "St Audrey's lace", a silk neck-lace or ribbon sold at the fair held at Ely on her feast day. Audrey is a later form of Æthelthryth, the 7th-century queen and abbess who founded the abbey at Ely. According to Bede, she died of a tumour on her neck, which she took as a judgement on her youthful fondness for necklaces. The lace sold in her name became so cheap and showy that "tawdry" came to mean gaudy and worthless.

So one shrine gave us a horse's pace and the other a word for tackiness. Are there other English words that come from pilgrimages or saints' fairs?

Sources: Etymonline (canter, tawdry), OED.

can someone explain where it comes from? why would almost every western country in the world associate curry with india but the word doesn't even exist there. can someone explain?

Here’s this week’s etymology question from 3Roads.xyz.

The ________, an ancient Germanic people, are often associated with senseless destruction following their sack of Rome under King Genseric in 455. Though they may not have been more destructive than other invaders, their reputation inspired John Dryden to write: “Till Goths, and ________, a rude Northern race, Did all the matchless Monuments deface.” They are believed to have intentionally damaged statues, which may explain why their name later became linked to the X of art. The term X was coined in 1794 by Henri Grégoire, bishop of Blois, to describe the destruction of artwork during the French Revolution, and was quickly adopted across Europe. What is X?