The interesting Etymology thread

KevRossi wrote: »

The 'blue men of the desert' certainly is/was a thing. Their robes used to be dyed with indigo from the Indigofera plant. It originated in India and was handled across much of North Africa, becoming a sign of status amongst Tuareg and various Berber ethnic groups. The dye ran into the skin and tinged it blue against the olive complexion of the Tuareg.

It has generally been replaced by synthetic dyes that do not run, so the effect isn't seen as much today. I spent time in the Sahel with them 30 years ago and it was fairly common back then. The traditional indigo dyed robes are effectively 'Sunday best' clothes these days and most people would rarely wear them.

Tuareg's are a very interesting bunch, the men wear a head covering and would almost never take it off in the presence of strangers, the women tend to go bareheaded or with a light covering. The women are also far more highly empowered compared to most other ethnic groups in the area, but on the other hand they have a very strong clan and caste system. Their way of life has changed almost totally in the past 50 years.

I don't think that is it.


Colour is weird in irish. Its idiomatic.


When referring to fur on an animal the word for red is RUE ....but on a door or anything its dearg.

Gorm in norse ...when referring to the skin means black. Its nothing to do with robes ...i think it also refers to leather. Like black leather you use gorm for. (could be wrong).

Also in irish ....fear dubh ...means a dark haired man.
There are a lot of people saying fear dubh means devil and that is why its not used.

But the THING IS fear dubh IS used all the time to refer to people with dark hair ....who are white.

Colours are WEIRD in irish ...and the words for each colour change according to what you are referring to .

Modern Irish for example uses different words for reg and green depending on what they are for.

Uaine is green for artificial things...and glas is green for natural things. The green on the irish FLAG is referred to as UAINE ..not glas.

When you REFER to a person with grey hair. You LITERALLY SAY A GREY MAN.


Chonaic me fear liath....I saw a grey man. Ta si rua ...she is red. Obviously we mean i saw a grey HAIRED man and she is a red head. But that is just the idiom of how the language works.

Also ....white people are not called duine ban...but duinne geal literally erm BRIGHT people. White win is not called ban ..its geal again.


Oraiste is not the COLOUR orange ...flannbhui is and an orange man is ....fear bui....which most people would think is yellow man.

Also when referring to a black dog ...you would say MADRA GORM. And skin is the same.

So red can be ...dearg or rua depending on what it is ....glas or uaine is green depending and gorm or dubh is black ...

And prob more stuff is diff too. :P

mikhail wrote: »

Yes, this is correct.


Yes, English is basically a graft of French vocabulary onto a Germanic language. I'm not aware of any others (though no doubt they exist) that are so blended between two different language families.

One of my favourite examples of a pair like that where the meaning shifted is demand, which originally meant to ask. A peasant would ask, but an aristocrat would demand, and so the meaning of demand shifted to something more imperious.

French? Are you joking? If English is a combination of anything its Germanic + Latin/Greek.

Google every word you typed in that post and see that its pretty much all Germanic + Greco/Roman. French has traces of grammatical influence, but its not at all similar with English. Loanwords are the main influence of French on English.