Unlocking the Universe of Languages
Explore the metal-crushing metaphors and poetic riddles of Old English known as Kennings. From the "whale-road" to the "bone-house", discover how these linguistic puzzles function and why ancient poets preferred…
Why do we say "feet" instead of "foots"? It isn't a random quirk of English grammar, but the result of an ancient biological pronunciation rule called "i-umlaut." Discover the logical…
Old English possessed a grammatical rarity called the "dual number", using specific pronouns—*wit* (we two) and *git* (you two)—to refer exclusively to pairs. This article explores how these lost words…
While modern English relies on the Latin alphabet, our language was originally written in the angular, 33-character runic system known as the Futhorc. This article explores the linguistic ingenuity of…
Discover why linguists consider Frisian to be the closest living sibling to the English language. This article explores the Anglo-Frisian branch of the West Germanic family, comparing vocabulary and the…
While most European languages form questions by simply swapping the subject and verb (like the German "Trinken Sie?"), English requires the addition of a meaningless "helper" word: the "Dummy Do."…
Ever wondered why we say "Ye Olde" to sound medieval? It turns out we've been reading it wrong for centuries. Explore the history of the letter Thorn (þ), the lost…
Have you ever wondered why candy is sometimes called a "sweetmeat", or why we "starve" from hunger but the word's roots simply mean "to die"? This blog post explores Semantic…
Ever wondered why 'you' is the same whether you're doing the action or receiving it, unlike "I" and "me"? This phenomenon, called case syncretism, is a fascinating story of grammatical…
Have you ever wondered why English grammar seems simpler than Latin or German? This phenomenon, known as grammatical evaporation, is a natural process where languages shed complex features like cases…
Most languages count one and many, but what about a number for precisely two? Discover the "grammatical dual", a lost feature of Old English that survives in languages like Slovene…
Why do 'through', 'tough', and 'though' sound so different? The answer isn't random chaos but a journey through history, from the Norman Conquest to the invention of the printing press.…
Forget Shakespeare. If you traveled back to 1000 AD, you'd find a language that sounds more like German and has more in common with Viking sagas than a sonnet. This…
Ever wondered why you can say 'I am running' but not 'I am musting'? These grammatical black holes are the work of 'defective verbs', fascinating linguistic fossils that lack a…
Just as paleontologists study fossils to understand ancient life, we can explore the fossils in our own language. Linguistic taphonomy reveals how words and grammar decay over centuries, leaving behind…
One sheep, two sheep. One fish, two fish. Ever wonder why some English nouns refuse to add an '-s' for their plural? This linguistic quirk, known as zero-marking, isn't a…
The Norman Conquest of 1066 wasn't just a military victory; it was a linguistic collision that created a centuries-long class divide in England. This pivotal event forced the Germanic tongue…
** Have you ever wondered why *shirt* and *skirt* sound so similar? They are "etymological doublets"—words from the same root that entered English via different paths, diverging in form and…