Etymology

[SMorientes]

Here it is: the thread you've all been waiting for!

I'm actually just starting this thread to recount an etymological adventure ( ) I enjoyed last year. I doubt the thread will see that much action but since someone suggested it...

Last year I started working in the orthopaedic department at the LGI, I only worked there for a few months, but the first week or so of my time there was mostly spent considering the origins of the term 'orthopaedic'. I didn't want to just look it up, I was trying to work it out myself - if you enjoy doing that yourself, stop reading and have a think because I'm about to start giving it away - but I was confused about the fact that at first glance it was something to do with children (paedia). So I thought of other words with paedia as a suffix and encyclopaedia sprung to mind, I wasn't too concerned about the former part of that word, but the suffix here seemed to mean 'education' which makes sense since it is children that we try to educate. So since orthopaedic means the study of the musculo-skeletal system, maybe the -paedia just means education or study of.
So what about ortho? Orthodox was the first thing I thought of, which seems to be to do with traditions. Then I thought of orthography, the system of letters, alphabets, writing and such: -graph referring to the writing, ortho could again mean tradition of. Hinting that maybe orthopaedic means traditional education? Doesn't make much sense. Then I thought of orthodontist. Traditional teeth doesn't make sense, but correcting teeth does, so does correct writing for orthography and correct something for orthodox (I just looked it up and it means correct opinion, ha! convention proves correctness).
But still education/study of correction doesn't make complete sense for orthopaedia, I suppose the doctors often are trying to correct broken bones and muscular injuries ... I felt a little stuck here and stayed pretty stuck for about a week, finally caved in and looked it up. Turns out the term orthopaedic was coined by a doctor who specialised in trying to straighten and correct children's spines in order to avoid bad posture and injury in adulthood. So the term literally means correcting children and has developed to cover the whole study of the musculo-skeletal system.

Anyway, so ends my story; not the most climactic of tales, but I'd enjoy it if other people know any words with interesting roots they want to share. Or just post the word and see if anyone can decypher the etymology themselves. I know there are a few polyglots on here so they might have an advantage and might also be able to reveal some interesting word links.

[Deleted User 2]

Simon, did you get paid for "doing" this job?

[SMorientes]

Yeah, I think they employed me to work out why the department was thusly named, because they let me go shortly after I told them I had figured it out...

[Deleted User 2]

Vaguely on-topic, my bread and butter - the programming language PHP is thus named because it stands for "PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor". Because acronyms aren't always good enough, they sometimes need to be recursive too.

[SMorientes]

that is funny. Sounds like the inventor of that name is a fan of recursion and palindromes.

[Deleted User 728]

My mum gave me her "Etymological Dictionary" when I was about 8 years old and I still have it today. It was battered when she gave it to me as she'd used it as a child during the 40s, so it must be getting on for 80 years old by now. Lovely book. Good topic

[SMorientes]

Tell you what's a very interesting word root: Venus. Ridiculously rich variety of words and meanings sprouting off of it. Ultimately comes down to Venus being goddess of love and representative of women and sex and such. Says a lot about ancient gender attitudes that it provides a root for venal - 'corrupt' from the latin root meaning 'up for sale', coming from the root of venus connoting women and sex (oldest profession in the world and all that) aswell as the root for venery: which in one sense means the sport and activity of hunting and has a homonym from the same roots being the gratification of sexual desire. This again says a lot about sexual attitude! And yet it also begets words like veneration and venerable, the ultimate form of worship and dignity. What a contradiction. But such has always been the attitude towards women. So go the adages, can't live with or without them &c. Necessary as blood (venus the root for venous and vein), then on the other side again there's venomous...
They're the main words that spring to my mind but I'm sure there are tonnes more that paint an interesting picture. Anyone think of any good ones?

[Deleted User 728]

What I find is interesting when people use the European/Metric version of the word "tonnes".
I mean, it's two whole extra letters to type/write/text - what's that all about ??

[SMorientes]

I very rarely write with any mind to saving myself any effort by being economical with my button presses. You may have noticed. You're the same!
Since I'm using it in the abstract sense and the units are irrelevant, tonne is preferable to ton primarily for aesthetic reasons. Ton feels like an Americanism aswell - even though it isn't - because it seems lazy and yet it still doesn't look like it spells the word right. Surely tun would be better?

[Barlow Boy]

I'm not sure what this thread is completely about to be honest, but it looks like something to do with spelling and words .

Anyway, one thing I asked my teacher once, and he didn't know the answer, was why do we say, One dog or dogs in the plural sense, and Bird or Birds in the plural sense but not say Sheep or Sheep(s) ?.