by Dwane | Apr 15, 2015 | Education, Latin, Vocabulary
Pawn: Something given as security for the payment of borrowed money; a pledge. This first definition has nothing to do with the Latin word for foot. Instead, it comes from an Old French word meaning pledge, or security. The pawn on the chess board, however, does from...
by Dwane | Apr 14, 2015 | Education, English, Greek, Vocabulary
Hexapod: a creature with six feet. Any arthropod of the class Hexapoda. In other words, an insect. Though he only has two feet, Marvel has brought a “hexapod” hero to the big screen: https://youtu.be/xInh3VhAWs8 Hexapod comes from the Greek word ἑξαποδία...
by Dwane | Apr 11, 2015 | English, Latin, Vocabulary
Pedestrian: a walker; someone who journeys on foot. As an adjective, something pedestrian describes a going on foot; walking; made on foot; as a pedestrian journey. Interestingly, pedestrian also means boring, mundane, banal, prosaic, or commonplace. When we use the...
by Dwane | Apr 11, 2015 | Education, Greek, Vocabulary
Gastropod: Snails and slugs. These guys are members of a class of mollusks (Gastropoda) that use their stomachs as a foot. I used to work with some guys like that. A scientist named Georges Cuvier coined the word in 1795. Cuvier created the word by combining the Greek...
by Dwane | Apr 9, 2015 | Education, English, Greek, Vocabulary
Chiropodist: a podiatrist. The word chiropodist has essentially dropped from English. It lost its job to podiatrist. A chiropodist was a hand and foot doctor. The word comes from the Greek words for hand, χείρ (pronounced, kheir) and foot, ποδός (pronounced,...
