What’s the difference between hand grenades and pomegranates? Not much when you think about their shape and the fact that they’re both packed tightly with small things, which is why both share a linguistic root with the word granular. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Grenades and Pomegranates”
Hello, you have A Way with Words.
Hi, this is Juliet calling from Temecula, California.
Hi, Juliet. Welcome to the program.
Hi.
Well, thank you.
What can we help you with today?
Well, I bought a tube of fancy French hand cream, and some of the ingredients on the label were in French, including pomegranate. And I noticed that the word for pomegranate in French was grenade, and it looked like the English word grenade. So I remembered that grenadine, like you put in drinks, is made from pomegranate juice. And that got me thinking about this word grenade and pomegranate and what the connection is. Because I was thinking about hand grenades and they kind of do look a little bit like pomegranate. It seems very improbable, but I’m wondering if that’s where the word came from.
Yes, great guess. Bing, bing, bing, bing, bing. That’s the winner’s bell. I should not believe it. Congratulations. Yes, the word grenade was adopted into English from French, and it originally meant pomegranate. And only later was it applied to that thing that you throw to explode.
Oh, interesting. Because they look the same, as you said. And they both have lots of small little particles inside, right? Doesn’t it mean having seeds or something like that?
Yes, yes. It goes back to Latin words that mean an apple full of seeds. It’s related to granular and words like that. And a hand grenade does have a lot of grains of explosives in it. Sometimes it even has little pieces of metal, right?
Yeah. Have you ever cut open a pomegranate?
A grenade?
No. Well, I have a pomegranate tree in my backyard. And so when I started thinking about this, I was looking, and the shape is exactly like a grenade. And, you know, that makes sense because the word for apple is pom. So that must be the…
Oh, that is so… I cannot believe it. It sounds so unlikely, but I guess unlikely can be true sometimes.
Well, cool, Juliet. You figured it out. You didn’t need us at all.
Well, thank you. Well, I love the verification. I need you to verify so I know that my hunch was right.
Oh, that’s so interesting. We are enabling backyard linguists everywhere we go. Thanks, Juliet.
Well, thank you so much. Okay, bye-bye.
Always trust your native instincts.
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