Why don’t nouns have gender in English they way they do in Spanish, French, or German? Before the Middle English period, nouns in English were either masculine, feminine, or neuter. Over time, however, we’ve moved away from the...
If something’s not in your bailiwick, it’s not in your jurisdiction or area of control. But what exactly is a “bailiwick”? Martha explains that the two words which make up the term — bailiff and wick — have specific meanings...
Dan in San Diego and friends were stumped after one friend jokingly called himself a woman’s mistress. There isn’t a crisp modern equivalent for an unmarried man involved with a married woman, partly because master and mistress once matched each...
In this week’s episode: Just how far back could you go and still understand the English people were speaking? We crank up our trusty time machine to find out. Hint: You’d probably have a tough time getting around in the eighth century...
Martha tries to unravel the tangled etymological web that connects gossamer, spiders, geese, and warm weather in a late autumn.
A caller has client who uses what sounds like a strange, three-syllable word: indice. The caller knows that the plural of index is indices. But, he wonders…indice? And should he talk about it with his client?