• edgemaster72@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    160
    arrow-down
    4
    ·
    10 months ago

    Also, it’s only a true gargoyle if it comes from the gargling region of France. Anything else is just a sparkling grotesque.

  • Varyk@sh.itjust.works
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    70
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    10 months ago

    Etymology of the word gargoyle, for anyone else who read the linked list in its entirety and found that gargoyle is not on it:

    https://www.etymonline.com/word/gargoyle

    Rather than the sound of water, it seems to refer to the throat of the statue through which water passes, which sounds like gargle in several languages. Several sites say it’s an onomatopoeia for the statue gargling water but I can’t find that reference specifically, except that the root words for gargle from Latin might be an onomatopoeia for the sound of gargling.

    If the statue is purely ornamental without the function for water to pass through it, it’s called a grotesque, chimera, or boss, so obviously I’m going to call them all bosses now.

    • Ada@lemmy.blahaj.zone
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      11
      ·
      10 months ago

      Garganta means throat in Spanish, so I’ve learnt something about the origins of that word now :)

      • Varyk@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        8
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        10 months ago

        Haha, I really want to show someone around New York or some larger city and point up and just be like “and you can see four bosses up there” and then get to explain what I mean.

        I wonder if those lions in front of libraries are bosses too, or if bosses have to be rooftop statues?

  • vamputer@infosec.pub
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    71
    arrow-down
    7
    ·
    10 months ago

    Sandwiches are named after a Welsh peasant dish that originally consisted of witch meat between two bricks of baked sand. It was terrible and offered little nutritional value, but was very popular due to the great availability of witch meat and lack of any real alternatives for nourishment.

      • GraniteM@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        61
        arrow-down
        2
        ·
        10 months ago

        Additional fun fact: “sandwich” is a degraded version of the original Welsh spelling, which is “syynndwrrrccchhchch,” and which was originally pronounced “klerb.”

  • themeatbridge@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    55
    arrow-down
    6
    ·
    10 months ago

    Onomatopoeia is itself an onomatopoeia because that’s the sound it makes when you say the word.

  • MrJameGumb@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    49
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    10 months ago

    Sandwiches are named after the Earl of Sandwich right? Have there been further developments?

  • Smuuthbrane@sh.itjust.works
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    40
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    10 months ago

    The sandwich is named for the sound of gargling dry white bread and overly processed deli meats that sandwich eaters made before the invention of garlic aoli.

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    34
    ·
    10 months ago

    The weird thing about the origin of the word sandwich is that everyone had been eating them for centuries, but one day the Earl of Sandwich orders one and they say, “it takes too long to say bread-and-meat, let’s just call it a sandwich.”

    By the way, no one knows for sure the etymology of ‘squid.’

    • Dr. Bob
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      6
      ·
      10 months ago

      There are a bunch of animal names like that. Notably “dog” and “chicken” just showed up without any real source. In middle English we have hounds, and fowls/cocks/hens. It’s strange for domestic animals that have been around forever to get renamed afor no apparent reason.

  • lemonuri@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    7
    ·
    10 months ago

    I’d heard the sandwich story before, but had no clew about some of the others!

  • MonkderZweite@feddit.ch
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    7
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    edit-2
    10 months ago

    ostrachise

    Huh? I thoght ancient greeks played with the idea of democracy but were mostly monarchistic?

    • RiderExMachina@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      17
      ·
      edit-2
      10 months ago

      It’s kinda true, but less exciting than the person made it sound.

      gargoyle (n.)

      “grotesque carved waterspout,” connected to the gutter of a building to throw down water clear of the wall … from Old French gargole

      gargle (v.)

      1520s, from French gargouiller “to gurgle, bubble” (14c.), from Old French gargole “throat, waterspout”

      https://www.etymonline.com/word/gargoyle

      https://www.etymonline.com/word/gargle

      • TrickDacy@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        1
        arrow-down
        4
        ·
        10 months ago

        Those are two different words though. If the OP had said they were related I wouldn’t protest because they likely are. But they stated it as a fact, which we do not know to be true.

        • SorryQuick
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          6
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          10 months ago

          In french, gargoyle is “gargouille”. The verb to gargle is “gargouiller”. Used in a sentence, the word is the exact same. “Il se gargouille”/“He gargles”.

          I don’t know, to me it seems pretty clear they’re related.

          • TrickDacy@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            10 months ago

            Related yes, “comes from” (the claim made here) we don’t know that for sure

            • SorryQuick
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              2
              arrow-down
              1
              ·
              edit-2
              10 months ago

              I mean, that can be said for literally everything, no? What kind of proof would you need? Everything about languages and the evolution of words is studied by experts, and I am not one of them, so what else can I do but take their word for it?

              If you look up their ethymology online, they are both from the same word. The wikitionary entry also claims it does come from it. https://fr.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/gargouille