I have written or presented about this topic at least 3 times in school, and it still amuses the hell out of me. I have distilled it down to 5 words, but I just found a paper that lists the whole 10, and I think it’s worth recording these down while the information still bubbles and frolicks around for me when I talk about it.
1. Fabular
-Spanish is one of the Romance languages which means it comes from Latin. Other Romance languages include French, Italian, Romanian, Catalan, and Portuguese, unfortunately.
-Fabular means ‘to tell a tale,’ which has morphed over the years to become the verb hablar, to speak. There are many words which begin with ‘f’ in Latin that changed to ‘h’ in modern Spanish. Exceptions are words with a diphthong after the ‘f’ like fuente (fountain), fuerza (force), and fuego (fire). [and then suddenly…]
March 21, 2011
in arabic,basque,best list ever,best post ever,diphthong,Etymology,history of language,IPA,izquierda,left-handedness,not basque,old-timey,patronyms,phonological constraints,spanish,Words & Origins,zurda
Lotsa times in Roman times, the children would be named after the father. For boys this meant duplication, and for girls it often meant changing the ‘-us’ to ‘-a’ in Claudius to Claudia, Julius to Julia, Flavius to Flavia, etc. I know this because of Rotten Romans by Terry Deary. This playlist is somewhat related to that fact.
1. Antonia – Motion City Soundtrack
2. Cecilia – Simon and Garfunkel
3. Cynthia – Millionyoung
4. Daria – Cake
5. Eugenia – Scott Joplin
6. Gloria – Van Morrison
7. O Valencia! – The Decemberists
8. Victoria – Jukebox the Ghost
9. Dancing Virginia – Jump, Little Children
10. I’m Coming Virginia – Artie Shaw
September 20, 2010
in horrible histories,latin,Music,names,patronyms,Playlists,rotten romans,short list