The Greek & Latin Roots of English (2 page)

The original development of the materials for this text was made possible by a grant to Hunter College from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

NEW MATERIAL IN THE FIFTH EDITION

The fifth edition has retained the organizational and thematic approach of the earlier editions. New material and exercises have been added to all chapters.

HOW TO USE THIS TEXT

1. In the vocabulary, both the nominative and genitive cases are given for all Latin nouns and adjectives. The principal parts of Latin verbs are also given.
   
2. An English word followed by Greek in parentheses indicates that the word is Greek in origin.
   
3. Because most words in English that are derived from Greek are learned borrowings, the genitive case of a noun or adjective is rarely cited, unless the compound form of the word is derived from that case.
   
4. Vocabulary words are sometimes repeated in different chapters when necessary.
   
5. Vocabulary words are generally listed in alphabetical order.
   

Symbols and Abbreviations Used

Instructor's Manual

An Instructor's Manual is available to adopters of this text. It contains:

Answers to all the exercises in the text

Quizzes on each chapter

Two final examinations

Answers to all quizzes and final examinations

Supplementary exercises, including answers

Suggested English derivatives for chapters 3–8

Photographs

All photographs, unless otherwise attributed, are from the author's private collection.

A POLYGLOT STEW
(Or Food for Thought)

Child with a goose (Museo Capitolino, Rome)

When you cook a crane, make sure that the head does not touch the water, but is outside it. When it has been cooked, wrap it in a warm cloth and pull its head
.

APICIUS (first-century CE Roman gourmet)

I'M SO HUNGRY!

If, in fact, we are what we eat, the American people are the most cosmopolitan nation in the world. Just as the English language is a mixture of Germanic, Latin, and Greek roots with a heavy seasoning of the Romance languages, with just a dash of Native American, African, and Caribbean, and a sprinkling of Asian vocabulary, so does our diet reflect the various linguistic ingredients that go into the melting pot of American cuisine.

The Normans conquered England in 1066 CE, and introduced, via French, Latin-based names for various foods; nevertheless, although English tastes and vocabulary were about to be expanded, the Germanic contribution to the English
menu
did not disappear. For example, Middle English
mete
made peace with the Old French
boef
, thus allowing both meat and beef on the dinner table, while the Germanic-based
chiken
nested quite comfortably with the French
poulet
. And if the English seemed to have lost their
appetite
after the Norman Conquest, the French tempted their
palates
with the introduction of such foods as
salmon, rice, and carrots
. French
pain
, however, never replaced Old English
bread
. Perhaps they found that too painful to contemplate.

The Normans may have introduced the English to the finer points of French cookery, but the spread of the British Empire introduced the English language to a host of new tastes from Asia, Africa, and North America. In turn, the extraordinary ethnic diversity of the United States has added its own linguistic flavors to American cuisine.

WHAT SHALL WE HAVE FOR DINNER?

We can eat geographically, as it were, starting off with some Latin-based
wine
, Gaelic
whiskey
, or Russian
vodka
. The German cities of
Hamburg
and
Frankfort
give us two staples of the American diet, whose flavor we can enhance with Chinese
ketchup
, French
mustard
, or a Dutch
pickle
. Or would you prefer Italian
pasta: linguini
, perhaps, or
spaghetti
, topped with some
cheese
from
Parma
, Italy? If we want to add a little spice to our lives, we can always order a
curry
at our local Indian
restaurant
, or call the neighborhood
pizzeria
.

Of course, a well-balanced diet needs a French
salad
filled with native and imported
vegetables:
the Native Americans of North and South America can provide
tomatoes, potatoes, squash
, and
avocados
, while the Arabs will contribute
spinach
. We can add a classical touch with
onions, lettuce
, and
peas;
even the lowly
radish
also has a Latin root.

And what is dinner without
dessert?
Some
fruit
, perhaps: an
orange
from Persia, or a
banana
from West Africa, or a much-traveled
apricot
, which passed from Latin into Arabic and then returned into Portuguese before making its way onto the English menu. If we crave something sweeter, however, what could be more American than
apple pie?
Or would you prefer some Central American
chocolate
, German
cake
or a
pretzel
, or perhaps a Dutch
cookie?
And you can wash it all down with some
coffee
from Turkey, or all the
tea
in China.

Vocabulary

appetite < Latin verb
appeto
= seek, desire

apple < Old English
aeppel;
cf. German
apfel

apricot < the original form of the word in English,
apricock
, from the Portuguese
albricoque
, which, in turn, came from the Arabic
al birquq
. The Arabic word, however, was a transliteration of a Latin adjective,
praecoquum
(early ripening), a term that could be applied to any fruit.

avocado < Spanish
aguacate
(< Nahuatl
ahuacatl
= testicle)

beef < Old French
boef
(< Latin
bos, bovis
= cow); cf. Modern French
boeuf

bread < Old English bread; cf. German
brot
,
but
Latin
panis
> French
pain
, Italian
pane
, Spanish
pan

cake < Middle English
kake;
cf. Icelandic
kaka
, German
kuchen
, Dutch
coek
. Cookie is a diminutive form of
coek
.

carrot < French
carotte
(< Latin
carota
< Greek
karoton)

cheese < Latin
caseus

chicken < Germanic
chiken

chocolate < Nahuatl
chocolatl

coffee < Turkish
kahve
(< Arabic
qahwah
) cf. French
cafe
(coffee shop), and
cafeteria

cuisine = French
kitchen; cookery

curry < Tamil
kari
(sauce)

dessert < French
desservir
(to clear the table)

fruit < Latin
fruor
= enjoy

lettuce < Latin
lactuca

meat < Old English
mete

menu = French
detailed list
(> Latin
minutus
= small)

onion < Latin
unio
(pearl)

palate < Latin
palatum
= roof of the mouth

pasta < Latin
pasta
(dough) (< Greek
pastos
= sprinkled). Originally, pasta was a kind of porridge sprinkled with salt.

pea < Latin
pisum
(cf. Italian
pisello
, French
pois)

pie < Middle English
pie
(shallow pit) < Old French
puis
< Latin
puleus
(well)

pizza < Italian
pizza <
derivation unclear, but perhaps Latin
placenta
(cake)

potato < Spanish
patata
(< Taino
batata)

poultry < Middle French
poulet
(< Latin
pullus
= young of any animal); cf. Spanish and Italian
pollo

pretzel < German
bretzel
(< Latin
bracellus
= bracelet)

radish < Old English
raedic
(< Latin
radix
= root)

restaurant < Latin
restauro
(restore)

rice < Old French
ris
(< Italian
riso
Greek
oryzon
(rice)

salad < French
salade
< Latin
salata
(salted)

salmon < Latin
salmon, salmonis
= salmon

spaghetti < Italian
spago
(cord, rope) linguini < Latin
lingua
(tongue)

spinach < Old Spanish
espinaca
(< Arabic
isfanakh)

squash < Narragansett Native American
askutasquash
(“thing eaten green”)

tea < Chinese
t'e
(Amoy dialect); the more common Chinese word is the Mandarin
ch'a
.

tomato < Spanish
tomate
(< Aztec
tomatl
)

vegetable < Latin
vegeo
(grow)

vodka < Russian
voda
(water)

whiskey < Gaelic
usqebaugh
(“the water of life”)

wine < Latin
vinum
(cf. French
vin
, and Italian and Spanish
vino)

Note:
A polyglot is someone who speaks many languages. You will learn the roots of this word very shortly.

LANGUAGE AND HISTORY