Saturday, December 30, 2006

English words with Venetian origins

As far as I can tell, the modern meanings and usage of the following English words, come from Venice proper:

arsenal
ghetto
conservatory
lagoon
italic
regatta
ciao
quarantine
zany
gazette
pantaloon
pants
madrigal
avocet
ballot
sequin
zero

Another country was named after Venice: Venezuela, and many islands and cities.

It's difficult to find specific orgins for the zeitgeist of contemporary meaning. But Venice was a contributor to the zeitgeist for: mask, carnivale, casino, bordello, opera, Palladian, sonata, toccata, piano, concerto, marionette, average, corporal, influenza, bank, banquet, pastel, Theorbo, imbroglio etc.

And, of course I'm leaving aside words that are still specific to Venice, and used only metaphorically otherwise: Gondola, Rialto, Doge, Magnifico, barcarole, etc.

A light, warm scarlet is "Venetian red".

Venice is indirectly mentioned in various languages, and in different ways, for its windows. In English we use both Venetian Windows and Venetian Blinds, for example.

"Polo" is a silly one: the name of the game is Tibetan, but the British used the nearest word they knew (from Marco Polo) to spell it.

Government bonds, deposit banks, disaster insurance and shared credit agreements more or less started in Venice. I'll try to track down words that crept our way (agio, or an exchange fee; cadastre, a registered property description) in those fields.

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home