The Story of English in 100 Words

by David Crystal

The world's foremost expert on the English language takes us on an entertaining and eye-opening tour of the history of our vernacular through the ages.In The Story of English in 100 Words , an entertaining history of the world's most ubiquitous language, David Crystal draws on one hundred words that best illustrate the huge variety of sources, influences and events that have helped to shape our vernacular since the first definitively English word—‘roe'—was written down on the femur of a roe deer in the fifth century. Featuring ancient words (‘loaf'), cutting edge terms that relfect our world (‘twittersphere'), indispensible words that shape our tongue (‘and', ‘what'), fanciful words (‘fopdoodle') and even obscene expressions (the "c word"...), David Crystal takes readers on a tour of the winding byways of our language via the rude, the obscure and the downright surprising.

Genres: Nonfiction, Language, History, Linguistics, Audiobook, Writing, Reference

288 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 13, 2011

About the author

David Crystal works from his home in Holyhead, North Wales, as a writer, editor, lecturer, and broadcaster. Born in Lisburn, Northern Ireland in 1941, he spent his early years in Holyhead. His family moved to Liverpool in 1951, and he received his secondary schooling at St Mary's College. He read English at University College London (1959-62), specialised in English language studies, did some research there at the Survey of English Usage under Randolph Quirk (1962-3), then joined academic life as a lecturer in linguistics, first at Bangor, then at Reading. He published the first of his 100 or so books in 1964, and became known chiefly for his research work in English language studies, in such fields as intonation and stylistics, and in the application of linguistics to religious, educational and clinical contexts, notably in the development of a range of linguistic profiling techniques for diagnostic and therapeutic purposes. He held a chair at the University of Reading for 10 years, and is now Honorary Professor of Linguistics at the University of Wales, Bangor. These days he divides his time between work on language and work on internet applications.

source: http://www.davidcrystal.com/

Reviews

[Petra X · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm on a linguistics kick at the moment. They make very pleasant audiobooks not to mention that it is extremely difficult to write about The Great Vowel Shift and convey it's meaning in print. This book is fairly light, I enjoyed it partly because of the narrator (the author) who has a North Wales accent (I'm from South Wales).

Unlike the first book of this linguistics kick I read, The Secret Life of Words: English Words and Their Origins by Prof. Anne Curzan who said she blushed when saying "cock" in a lecture even though it had two meanings, David Crystal is quite happy to discuss the word 'cunt, without resorting to Curzan's 'c-word'. There was a lane in London called by the apparently not-uncommon name Gropecunt Lane. A road frequented by prostitutes. These lanes have now been renamed Grope Lane. The village I grew up in had only two roads, one of them was called Cowshit Lane - the cows passed up there from the meadows to the farm which had been there since medieval times. Now the fields and farm have gone and there are houses and a school, it is called Cowshed Lane. How disappointing.

This book doesn't have the weight of Prof. Seth Lerer's The History of the English Language nor quite the entertainment value of the wonderful Prof. John McWhorter's Language A to Z which, despite being a Great Course, could pass as intellectual stand-up comedy. Nevertheless, this book was very enjoyable and interesting.

Now on to something a bit heavier. Proto-Indo-European roots maybe?

[Paul Bryant · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought- hello, let's use the 100 words to review this wee book, sort of like the well-known sentence “the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog” which uses all the letters in the alphabet. It seemed mega doable, it could be so cute, but it very quickly it became a royal pain in the arse. I dilly-dallied, I couldn’t get going. I stared out my window for inspiration. There were no UFOs - again. I read the blurb on a shiny new paperback and thumbed through the ever-boring Sherwood Gazette. For the purposes of this review it would be handy if there was a bone-house on my street but you don’t get those in residential areas. Or an ink-horn on my desk! But no, I threw away my last ink-horn in 1921. And there are very few skunks in Nottingham, y’all, except for the kind you smoke. So I got fed up with the whole idea and started a Sudoku riddle. I got the munchies even though it was past brunch and hours until lunch. I thought I’d phone for a take away. That would be dinkum, better than a trek to Tescos. “Now, what could I have, hmm… loin of pork with caramelised potato? Egg fu yung? Escalope of brock? Medallion of muggle?“ But I remembered I had no money on me so I just had a vanilla yogurt and a cup of tea. I needed to chillax - ugh, what a word, no I didn’t, this whole stupid review idea was a lot of fopdoodle - how, for instance, was I going to shoehorn a merry bridegroom with an undeaf bodgery in his pocket in without descending into bloody ridiculous contrivance? I was trying to keep it real and not have the thing sound like a page out of a Murakami novel. I lost interest in the whole thing – which may I say did not make me disinterested - the terminal confusion between UNinterest and DISinterest gets my shibboleth, and all that jazz. OK, that just makes me another fool trying to prevent the necessary change which English goes through all the time. Grammar morphs, Americanisms and dialect insinuate, and the speech-craft of the crazy kids in those webzine doobries whose neologisms edit polite speech on a daily basis show that evolution of language ain’t stopping for me nor anyone else, even though some things set my teeth on edge like those nasty PC linguistic contortions they try to foist upon us. We owe a debt to the entire gaggle of past rule-disregarders – Willie Shakespeare being a major dude in this regard.

I switched the tv on idly, channel-hopping. The music channel was some veejay schmoozing a garage band called The Strine Mipelas - they were terrible. The SF Movie channel was offering The Matrix , Species, and I Robot. I’d seen them all. Over on the news channel a dame in a taffeta skirt (what do I know?) gave me the information that another banker had been given a billion dollar bonus instead of a jail sentence. I note the top three – top three! executives at Barclays resigned in the past five days – can bankers' reps sink any lower? When you listen to these creeps you just get a riddle wrapped in the doublespeak of a wicked dragsman. They thought Nixon and his little Watergate pals were the nadir of Western corruption at the time but this latest crew – if the law ever does catch up with them they’ll all claim they have early onset Alzheimer’s and they'll skate. Do you think some people are born with unslakeable greed in their DNA? Seems to me that life used to be a lot pleasanter – back in those olden days a swain would ride a roe over a lea to see his valentine, quaff some mead and never have to worry about being unfriended in the Twittersphere. Their chattels were few, their hearts correspondingly lighter. They didn't know a killer app from a loaf of bread and to them cherry-picking meant picking cherries – lol! And try explaining the concept of having to bagonise to a swain… oh you haven't heard of that either? It's a made up word which won a competition on a radio show organised by David Crystal – it refers to those anxious moments when you're waiting for your luggage at the airport carousel. Quite cute, but no one will actually say "I had to bagonise for 45 minutes then finally saw my holdall and thought "Gotcha!" A bit silly really.

Enough of this blathering – I love this geeky book and I think you will too – there are a lakhsworth of fascinating factlets on every page. David Crystal's elevator certainly goes to the top of his high-rise, if you get my drift. I was thinking that they'd have to invent another ology just for this sort of book, but they already did – etymology. Anyway, it was grand.

[Katie Lumsden · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really interesting read for anyone curious about etymology and linguistics.

[Cindy Rollins · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lovely and interesting look at 100 words and all the words around them.

[Manybooks · Rating 2 out of 5]

Although parts of David Crystal’s The Story of English in 100 Words have definitely been fun and entertainingly enjoyable, personally and on an entirely academic and intellectual level I for one just do not really think that these one hundred selected and chosen by the author English vocabulary words could ever even remotely tell the actual and full linguistic history of English. And yes indeed, I would in fact say the exact same regarding any and all languages, period (as in my opinion, there is much more to language history than simply or mostly vocabulary, and well, that a list of one hundred words could tell the entire history of a language, I do find that claim and assertion rather simplistic at best and even a trifle ridiculous). Therefore and truly, while The Story of English in 100 Words has without a doubt and certainly been an interesting enough way to spend a few hours (and I do appreciate that David Crystal has kept his writing style comparatively simple and generally devoid of linguistic jargon), ultimately for me, The Story of English in 100 Words has been rather disappointing and actually not really linguistically rigorous and academic enough, has been too much on the surface and lacking in depth, with neither enough linguistics nor with sufficient etymological details on the selected 100 words (on their genesis and equally why they have been chosen by David Crystal above other words, why he thinks these 100 vocabulary offerings supposedly tell the linguistic history of the English language).

Three more than a bit grudging stars for The Story of English in 100 Words, but yes, now lowered down to but two stars, as I do indeed consider it rather majorly problematic (and even somewhat arrogant) that instead of a bibliographic list of works cited and consulted, there is but a list of David Crystal’s own linguistic tomes offered at the back of The Story of English in 100 Words.

[Jacklynn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I definitely now know a lot of stuff that no one would want to hear in typical conversation.

[Lauren · Rating 3 out of 5]

Entertaining and light history of the English language in a listicle format. Crystal states upfront that these are his choice of 100 words, not THE 100 words, and I liked his open approach throughout the book. He isn't stodgy and dogmatic, he enjoys the evolution of the language and doesn't denigrate textspeak, instead showing that these shifts have happened dozens of times over the centuries. He moves through the book chronologically, working through Old English to modern slang.

He makes a special point to show the geographical variations of English, including British (his birthplace), Australian, American, South African, and even includes 'pidgin' English (his words - not sure if this is the technical term?) - clearly stating that many of these languages are evolving so much that there is a case for English as a family of languages. This is surely the case of English in the Caribbean (unfortunately he didn't cover any words from these regions - although it is so rich with examples of English varieties! I'd love to read a book on that...).

Alas, he limited himself in 100 words, so I know that there was so much more he could have said!
It was a fun book, and one I would recommend to language lovers and trivia buffs - there are some great stories here!

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enjoyable little book about the history of the English language and all of its many sources. An incredibly informative work for those who enjoy reading about the origin of words, and all those crazy little stories that have turned our language into what it is today.

As an added bonus, you suddenly have an infinite supply of little factoids to throw out about the history of various parts of English:

(these may count as spoilers?)

- In legal contracts, there are very commonly phrases with two words that mean the same thing, like "fit and proper" or "will and testament" or "cease and desist" or "null and void". This was due to a transition eight hundred years ago, when lawyers in England started switching from Latin or French to English in their contracts. Unsure if the Latin or French word meant the exact same as the English counterpart, and unwilling to leave it up to a court, they just used both words... and we have ever since.

- You often hear about all of those "collection" words that are often humorous -- "a gaggle of geese", "a muster of peacocks", "a sentence of judges" ...!? It turns out that most of these were probably invented by the prioress of the Sopwell nunnery in the late 15th century, and were included in The Book of St. Albans, one of the first printed English books.

- Often times, when there are multiple words in English that mean the same thing (or nearly so), it's because they originated from different sources. So, we have "ask" (Germanic), "question" (French), "interrogate" (Latin). "Fire" (Germanic), "Flame" (French), "Conflagration" (Latin). There are many examples of such triplets, and generally, any differences in meaning were introduced later, well after the words were standard English.

- Sometimes it's not the words that come from different languages, but the spelling. "Music" has been spelled over forty different ways in the last six hundred years; from "musiqe" and "musycque" and "moosic" to "mewsycke" and "misic" and "mwsick"... not really sure how to even pronounce that last one.

- If all this weren't complicated enough, in the 16th and 17th century, the English obsession with Greek and Roman times led to the Latinization of many common older words. Ever wonder why there's a "b" in Debt? It was spelled "det" or "dett" until this happened. Same with the b in Subtle, the l in Fault, and the p in Receipt, among plenty more.

Isn't English fun?

[Muphyn · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wonder whether it was the format of the book that didn't quite gel with me but whilst I found the beginning quite interesting - with words such as "and" or "loaf" - I eventually tired of this sheer endless word listing. Perhaps this kind of approach is better suited to 'reading'.

I also find Crystal's insistence on talking about, and in fact using the word, "netspeak" strange but I'm willing to give him the benefit of doubt since it may actually get used in the UK. I've certainly never heard anyone speak of "netspeak" (including linguists) in Australia (and yes, I'm aware of Crystal's book "Language and the internet", I read it years ago...).

Overall, it's a mildly entertaining, albeit personal (as Crystal readily admits), collection of words, illuminating the history of the English language. Some items were more fascinating than others (eg 'twittersphere' was pretty unspectacular) but it should be fairly accessible for anyone with an interest in languages.

What I must say about the audio version is though that I appreciated Crystal's pronunciation of various lexical items, especially Old English ones, bringing them to life with his expert pronunciation, AND his attempts at a range of accent (quite impressed with the Australian and South African ones).

Kind of enjoyable but a little dry at times, bordering on boring. 2.5 stars.

[Bibliovoracious · Rating 4 out of 5]

I generally don't like list books - there's no through path to entertain, but this one was pretty great, because it was organized historically, so there was a subtle development through-line. And funny. I was suspicious though; I didn't have as much confidence as I should that a "foremost scholar of English" was telling me the truth. Not after "Edison invented the telephone" (when Alexander Graham Bell was a kind of linguist in his own right!).

[Elena · Rating 5 out of 5]

I found this book highly entertaining, curiosity satisfying, full of surprises, clever and kind. Exactly how I order my reading. Sending it directly to my shelve of favorites and ordering one more book (will be my third) of David Crystal from my local library. Too bad there is no more books of his in audio format there (it takes me forever to go through a paper one).

[Moonkiszt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Aw! I'm so sad this book is over. . .I allowed myself no more than 5 words a day!

Each word chosen to discuss was a diving board into language changes from the beginning of English's emergence from the melting pot of Olde English and even older versions through to the date of the book's publishing. Only 100 words from all those billions? Still, a world of education was in that read, and I'm busy hunting down David Crystal's other works, over the moon happy that there seems to be plenty of them!

I started this as an audiobook, but soon became perturbed - so much spelling, and a deep suspicion that i was missing illustrations that would have even enhanced this read. Because of that I found a e-book to read along as I listened to David's English Voice and the experience was much better - I was right! Reading the words, seeing the spellings, and all those photographs made it an even better ride.

If you are a Wordie, you'll like (love?) this book! If you are not, hmm. To everything, turn, turn, turn, there is a season, yada, yada, yada. . . .as you were. . . ..

[Nicole · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars

[Kris · Rating 3 out of 5]

Crystal tells little mini-stories or mini-histories of words, in a few paragraphs. His tone of voice is humorous and engaging. I still prefer the longer formats like The Story of English. But for what it does, it does well.

[sabisteb aka callisto · Rating 5 out of 5]

David Crystal dürfte neben John McWorther wohl einer der bekanntesten englischen Linguisten sein. In unterhaltsamer Art und Weise wird hier die diachrone Linguistic mit modernen Beispielen durchexerziert und auch nebenbei noch die synchrone englische Linguistik abgehandelt. Besonders die wordbuilding rules haben es ihm angetan. Einige der Texte kann man sicherlich gut im Unterricht einsetzen und die SuS die Regeln selber formulieren lassen anhand der Beispiele und sie anschließend Kreativ neue Wörter generieren lassen, anhand dieser Regeln.
Interessant fand ich auch, dass muggle kein neues Wort ist, sondern eigentlich aus dem 13. Jhdt stammt und die Bedeutung „fish-like tail“ oder im 17. Jhdt. „sweetheart“ bedeutete. Im amerikanischen street slang stand das Wort eine Weile lang für Marijuana und Marijuana addictes were mugglers. Mug hatte anscheinend auch mal die bedeutung „doolish or incompetent person“.
Das Buch behandelt auch einige Schimpfworte. Will man mal was interessantes im Unterricht machen, wie böse, böse Worte, hat man hier schön linguistisch aufgearbeitete Kapitel, die auch die unterschiedliche Verwendung in UK/US und Australien vergleicht.
Das Hörbuch wird von David Crystal selbst gelesen. Er ist ein wunderbarer Vorleser, was man von einem Linguistikprofessor, dessen Sohn Shakespeareschauspieler ist, auch erwarten kann.
Einige der Beispiele kamen mir extrem bekannt vor aus den Vorlesungen. Entweder sind es Klassiker, oder mein Prof hatte sie aus diesem Buch.
Fazit: Sehr unterhaltsame Einführung in die diachrone und synchrone Linguistik. Teilweise Oberstufentauglich.

[Andrew Fish · Rating 5 out of 5]

OK - it was a bit of a system shock after reading The Etymologicon: A Circular Stroll through the Hidden Connections of the English Language to read a similar book with no comedy mileage, but once you get over that, this book is as cleverly planned and incredibly informative.

The author has taken a series of words, each of which represents a development in the English language, such as the introduction of words from a particular source, through ways of manipulating existing words to create others and the word-melding which modern business and the Internet have produced. There are surprises along the way (I always saw gaol as less English than jail, for example) and, as with the Etymologicon, you won't absorb everything in one reading. The easy-going style means it won't be a problem dipping into it again, so that's not really a problem.

[Davenport Public Library Iowa · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great book for history buffs, word nerds, and those fascinated by how slang and language changes over time, this is a crash course in the development of the English we speak today around the world.

David Crystal has carefully chosen 100 very different words to show the history and real-time use of English, and the effect is engaging and fascinating. Each word's vignette is brief, to the point, and sprinkled with humor. Toward the end as modern words and e-culture coinages come into play, Crystal is humble, gently perplexed by the turns English has taken, and slightly out-of-touch, an effect which will only get worse the more time passes since the book's publication.

All in all a charming and well-paced collection with a lot of history to teach, but also with empowerment to share: the examples consistently illustrate the power of the users to shape the English language present and future.

[Trey Stone · Rating 5 out of 5]

I didn't know what I expected when I picked this up, but it's exactly what it says in the title. In a hundred words (or actually, a few more) the author goes through the entire creation, evolution and development of the English language as we know it today.

Whether you are particularly fond of words, if you write them, study them, or just try to speak them in your normal, every-day life, this is a fascinating book. Have you ever heard of a 'legal doublet', for example, the use of phrases that contain two words that mean exactly the same, like 'cease and desist'? Wonder why that came about? Well, this book will tell you that and so much more. Did you know that the sandwich is named after a place name? Or that that the word 'muggle' used to be associated with drugs?

Highly recommended for any lover (or hater) of the English language. This book is really fun.

[Nate · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting, enlightening and sometimes pretty funny.
This answers a lot of questions my wife has asked me as English isn’t her first language. I can only imagine the confusion at the time when French and Latin words and suffixes were added to germanic English at an exponential rate after the Norman invasion.
There were sometimes tens of spellings for the same word depending on the dialect and on top of all that, some people started adding in more Latin to make English sound more eloquent, further complicating the issue.
Why aren’t words in English spelled like they sound? Because we borrow fancy words and can’t make up our minds. There seem to be no truly immutable rules in our language despite the cries of the pedantic and it keeps changing all the time.

I gave this three stars because despite the early parts discussing the origins of the language, taboo words and ever softening language as once technical or medical words were found offensive, the later chapters focused on late 20th and early 21st century colloquialisms that are more than familiar to anyone reading this book.

[Zadignose]

I enjoyed it, I learned a few things from it, and I would probably enjoy more of it if it were longer. But I also think I'd have to read it or listen to it again to make it stick, and I'm not sure... but I think I needed more development in each chapter... something deeper maybe, or more examples of use in context. I think this might serve well as a starting point for further investigation. Yet, who am I fooling? Do I have time for such an investigation right now? Maybe a cursory review was all I had the energy and attention for now, anyway.

[Kevin · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book, learned the first English word and "Bill and Ted" even gotten a section under the word dude. My favorite of the 100 words was fopdoodle, fop a fool, doodle a simpleton thus fopdoodle was a fool twice. Luckily the author was only a fopdoodle once that I caught when he credited Thomas Edison for the invention of the telephone instead of Alexander G. Bell. But it's a book about words not inventions.

[Akbar Madan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Vocabulary in all languages ​​is considered the first material of the language, knowledge of its origin and diversity, how this diversity happened, social and political conditions and other factors that contributed to the formation of vocabulary and the increases that entered into it or distortions, all of this will constitute an enjoyable journey in the world of the vocabulary industry drawn by us, the linguist David Crystal, we learn about the roots of vocabulary and its transformations from its very beginnings until the present moment.

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a delightful, quick journey through the origins, peculiarities and complexities of the English language.

David Crystal obviously knows a lot, but it was clear that in this book, he wanted to keep it entertaining and accessible.

He uses 100 different words to explore everything from collective nouns (a gaggle of geese) to borrowings from Latin and French, to Americanisms, to the new words that have crept in from the internet and social media.

He tells us about words like condom and gimmick that have no known origin story. We learn that reduplications -- pairs of words that differ by a vowel -- always start with the short vowel first, as in flim flam or dilly dally. We get to see a few lost words from Samuel Johnson's dictionary, including curtain lecture, when a wife berates her husband at bedtime. We find out that the Hebrew word shibboleth refers to an Old Testament story in which a man from one tribe is executed by another tribe because he cannot pronounce the sh in that word. And we get such delightful factoids as Valentine being the first known instance of a name becoming an everyday word in English.

It's a quick read, an informative read and just a wonderful excursion for anyone fascinated by our language.

[Lamilla · Rating 5 out of 5]

http://www.bookcrossing.com/journal/1...
October offer in one book a month game

[Shiloah · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is perfect for the novice philologist! There are so many words I thought were modern and are not! My inner nerd absolutely loves learning the history of words.

[Dan Smith · Rating 2 out of 5]

A disappointing and lacklustre book. It promises to tell the history of English in 100 words, and obviously I wasn't going to take that literally, but it could have made an effort. The chapters are enticingly in chronological order, and listed in the Contents along with their nature: a borrowed word, a portmanteau word, a scientific word, etc.

But the execution is plodding. For the most part, what we learn is prosaic and surface remarks. e.g. from a chapter about words of Indian derivation we learn that: there are some, here they are, and we got them when we went to India. You amaze me. Other words are Australian, or Japanese. Music was spelt many different ways, but not so much since Johnson's dictionary. Really. Rhubarb used to have no h. Oh.

Some words expand, like nation to denationalisation. Other shrink, like edit from edition, automate from automation. Some haven't taken, like helicopt. Right, OK...

American pronounce words differently: garage, schedule, tomato. There are initialisations like FBI, and acronyms like NATO, and oddities like IOU. Fine, fine, but *please* tell me whether any of this actually means anything, or provide some insight into hidden connection.

At other times, what the author says is relatively fatuous, ending in a rhetorical flick like at the end of a TV news article: use of proper names for words leads to odd sentences like "would you like some Earl Grey?"!! Hilarity itself.

And then other bits betray a lack of thought: he mentions "oojamaflip", which is fine, then ends with a grace note that he's only ever used it in this article. No: you've mentioned it. And shuriken is vacantly defined as "(a type of weapon)". The dust jacket says you're "the foremost expert on English", buck up.

There are some moments of interest: hlaf-weard, or "bread warden" shortened to laird and lord. Rohan's Meduseld literally means "mead hall". Lawyers double up words like "cease and desist", "fit and proper" to accommodate English/French and Latin speakers. Glamour and spell - seemingly magical - both derive from today's more prosaic grammar and spelling. There are hugely entertaining specialties on the etymology of OK.

But overall the whole thing smacked of an academic thinking "I'm a top flight professor of linguistics, I'm sure I can write me one of those etymology dip-into books", and then sitting down and rattling off a list of bland and shallow facts, and lists of what words come from where. The Etymologicon is a much better read for this type of thing.

[Emily · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was fun: I always enjoy David Crystal's writing, and a whistlestop lexicographical history of English was ideal territory for his deft popularisation skills. Anything remotely technical was handled with a very light touch, which made complete sense, as this book was clearly intended to sit towards the entertaining end of the scale and reach as broad an audience as possible; however, that didn't stop me regretting a handful of what seemed like missed opportunities to draw the interested reader a bit more deeply into what linguistics has to offer.

There was plenty of complete news to me in here, including a few real gems. I had never given any thought before to the "legal doublets" that have made their way into common parlance ("fit and proper", "wrack and ruin", "peace and quiet", etc.) — turns out these are the result of lawyers in the Middle Ages trying to cover their bases by including terms from both English and French or French and Latin. I had no idea that grammar is delightfully cognate with grimoire, nor had it occurred to me that robot is related to the Russian работа (rabota, "work"), though it seems obvious in hindsight.

A small number of entries seemed to be missing not just the slightly more linguistically-oriented discussion I would have enjoyed, but in fact the entire reason I would have expected them to be there in the first place. For instance, I was a bit surprised that the entry for matrix didn't so much as mention the mathematical use of the term that I would have considered its main (modern) meaning, and bewildered as to how the entry for Watergate could fail to explain how it spawned a whole new productive bound morpheme, -gate (meaning "scandal").

Overall, this was a very nice little piece of entertainment, especially for easy dipping in and out. I reckon it probably does a great job of hooking people who didn't know this way of thinking about words could be engaging.

[Julie · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you are interested in where words come from and their age this is a great book. For example did you know that the word brass ( meaning money ) existed in the 16th century. I really enjoyed the discussion around where words originated. For example, What, originally was an exclamation used to get someones attention. And posh English folk used it until the early 20th century with 'Whatho'.Anyone who likes the Jeeves series of books will appreciate knowing the origin of this word.

The book gives about 2 - 3 pages to each of the words so it does not go into great details it is more of an overview of the history of the English language and how are weird spelling came to be.
An easy read well worth the time.

[Nicky · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fun format for a book on language. It doesn't tell me that much that I didn't know, but it was fun to flip through anyway, and it gives the truth behind a couple of myths (like the origins of the word "okay"). Some of it's pretty amusing, too.

[Rachel Stevenson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I knew some of the info in this book (this is not my first etymological rodeo) such as Will and Testament being the same word in Anglo Saxon and Norman, but the fact that we now say egg rather than eyren because of William Caxton was hitherto unknown. Egg was the Norse word and used more in the north of England. Eyren (like Ei in German) was used in the Anglo Saxon east of England but ol' Caxty had to make a choice when printing (a breakfast menu perhaps?) and he chose the Viking word.

Other things I didn't know: collective nouns (e.g. gaggle of geese, murder of crows) were invented by an Abbess in the 14th century. Magick became magic because Americans dropped the k. There was no Bible in English until the 1500s. There was no word for alphabet until the 1500s (busy century). Disinterested and uninterested had the opposite usage to today in the 18th century. Germans and Scandinavians pronounce words beginning with J as Y because J and I were interchangeable until the English decided that J was just a soft G (the French influence).

There's also a lot of plus ca change – people have always made up words, combined words, changed the meaning of words, so neologism and portmanteau word refuseniks are not saving the past. Also there's always been debate between the long flowery sentence Latin-influenced brigade (called inkhorns in the 16th century) and the short sharp Anglo Saxon fans (let's call them Jamesians and Hemingwites).

One thing that had never occurred to me was that accents come from olden times, for example street was pronounced straet in old Anglo Saxon, pretty much how someone from East Anglia would pronounce it now.