It's 200 years since the word "hello" was first used in print - though its roots date back to the 15th Century. How has the ...

In the 1660s, Robert Hooke looked through a primitive microscope at a thinly cut piece of cork. He saw a series of walled boxes that reminded him of the tiny rooms, or cellula, occupied by monks.

Science historian Howard Markel discusses the origins of the word moon and some of the lore surrounding it, including a 1638 book by the English bishop Francis Godwin entitled The Man in the Moone, ...

“Every word was coined by a resourceful individual or borrowed as a result of language contact in a certain place at a certain time,” writes Anatoly Liberman in his new book, “Word Origins and How We ...

Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring. Those who happen to be mused sufficiently in the art and science of etymology, the study of the origins and histories of words; those, in other words, ...

Origin Uncertain: Unravelling the Mysteries of Etymology. By Anatoly Liberman. Oxford University Press; 344 pages; $29.99 and £22.99 MANY WORDS are puzzles themselves. “Conundrum” confounds scholars; ...

My fellow bloggers over at BNET Intercom have revealed some fun facts about National Boss Day (which is today, by the way, lest you forget to buy your boss a box of chocolates or a bottle of the ...