Words Words Words

Some random trivia about words and language that I found quite interesting, found in a nifty little book entitled The Mother Tongue by Bill Bryson:

The Italians have over 500 names for different types of macaroni. Strozzapreti means "strangled priests." Vermicelli means "little worms." Spaghetti means "little strings." Muscatel in Italian means "wine with flies in it."

Arabs are said to have 6,000 words for camels and camel equipment.

The Romans had no word for gray. To them it was another shade of dark blue or dark green.

Shakespeare used 17,677 words in his writings, of which at least one tenth had never been used before. Imagine if every tenth word you wrote were original. It is a staggering display of ingenuity. Words that Shakespeare alone gave us: barefaced, critical, leapfrog, monumental, castigate, majestic, obscene, radiance, dwindle, countless, submerged, excellent, fretful, gust, hint, hurry, lonely, summit, pedant, cranny, beautified, homicide, aggravate, forefathers, snow-white, fragrant, brittle, gloomy.

The distress signal mayday comes from the French cry m'aidez (meaning "help me").

A few awesome words that will make cameos in my original prose:
- Crytoscopophilia - the urge to look through the windows of the homes you pass
- Myoclonic jerk - that sudden sensation of falling just as you are dropping off to sleep
- Ugsome - a late medieval word meaning loathsome or disgusting