Literary Hub – Joshua Blackburn Explores the Centuries-Long Evolution of the English Language: “Every word originates somewhere. It may be borrowed or coined, named after a person, inspired by a place or imitative of a sound. It could have evolved over the long journey from Proto-Indo-European (a reconstructed ancient language for which no evidence exists), or coined just last year. But for anyone interested in etymology—the study of the origin and development of words—there’s pleasure in finding out where, why and when words came to be. Sometimes etymology is a simple business. Eponyms, for instance. Words like dunce (after John Duns Scotus), nicotine (after Jean Nicot) or diesel (after Rudolf Diesel) are no riddle. Other words, like robot, poodle and porpoise, are fun to discover, but also well-documented. Then there are the words of Germanic, French and Latin origin that account for much of the English language. These can require more unraveling, and the further back one goes, the more conjecture there is. Take slang, the informal nonstandard language that fills our world. Everyone knows what slang is, but not where the word comes from. Is it related to the narrow strips of land known as “slangs,” or with the Scots “slanger,” meaning to dawdle, or with the Norwegian “slengjeord,” meaning a mocking word? Neither slang experts nor the OED know. Which brings us to the three words no etymologist wants to write: “Of unknown origin.” For instance, no one knows the origin of dog. Similarly, frog, hog, pig and stag. They certainly look to be related, but beyond that, etymologists are stumped. What’s surprising is how many everyday words are “of unknown origin.” One might expect the source of girl or ink or tantrum would be known. But such words often have ancient roots, and the longer the history, the murkier the evidence gets…”