Words are funny things, aren’t they? Some words are more important than others, and two words can mean the complete opposite, take love and hate for example, never has there been a better example of two very important words that are a complete contrast to one another! Most of the time the words people use are learned from others and, as such not much thought goes into how they came to be, odd really, especially if you say some words over and over again! Some can start to make even less sense the more you say them…… Perhaps some answers about how certain words came into use would be of use.
Table of Contents
3 Words to Get You Started
1. Berserk
When someone “goes berserk”, they go into a frenzy, run amok, and perhaps even destroy things. If you imagine what somebody going crazy looks like to you in your mind then the word ‘berserker’ seems to be a pretty fair choice of letters to end up with for the ancient Norse warriors.
There are a few different theories throughout the books of time but, essentially the word ‘beserker’ was a word to describe the people, or person. Whereas the word “berserk” was used to describe the act of being crazy
2. Bondage
It doesn’t take generosity to know where the majority of people’s minds have gone to right about now, to be fair though, you’d probably find it hard to come across somebody that thought differently. Some words have one meaning to people because the word isn’t used for anything else but to describe the ‘thing’ that they think they know.
Interestingly enough, if you have a quick look into the history books, you’ll probably find another joke to be had although the nature of the meaning behind the word was a much more sinister one! The word itself dates back to the 1300s and was used to describe the condition of slaves at the time, furthermore, when the word ‘bondage’ is broken down into its syllables you get ‘bond’ and ‘age’.
Usually, the word bond is used to describe anything that ‘binds’ or sticks together which describes the slaves pretty well considering that they were stuck doing whatever they were made to do…. ‘Age’ kind of speaks for itself, referring to the point in time that the slaves were from, finding themselves in a state of ‘bondage’.
3. Clue
Go on then, give us a clue… Actually, the answer goes a little further than simply giving a ‘clue’, in fact, the word itself goes back many, many years and comes from Greek mythology! There’s an ancient story whereby one of the Greeks gives another Greek a ball of yarn which they call ‘clew’.
With the aid of the clew, a method was devised so that it was easier to fathom a way out of the Minotaur’s lair. And, thus the word ‘clue’ was used in the context of giving somebody a ‘helping hand’, it wasn’t until much later on in the 15th century that the spelling was officially changed to ‘clue’.
Word Fun
If you ever have any spare time on your hands, why not spend a little of it each day to check out where some of the most common, or odd-sounding words you use originated from, you may be very surprised indeed.
