Thistread about boycotts for some reason made me wonder about where the word “boycott” comes from. It turns out that the origin of the word is a certain Charles Cunningham Boycott, who was ostracised by his community in 1880 because of some business about agrarian tenants’ rights. Some googling turns up more examples of words like this. I especially like “dunce”, named after John Duns Scotus, and “shrapnel”, after General Henry Shrapnel, who invented the “shrapnel shell”.
Can you think of more common words named after people? I’m not thinking of words like “aspirin”, that used to be trademarks but have become common terms for a kind of product, just regular words that you normally don’t think of as having their origin in names.
(EDIT: I suppose I could have posted this in GQ… feel free to move.)
There’s “cardigan” and “raglan,” as in the style of sleeve. I’ve always thought it odd that two British military figures who fought in the Crimean War became associated with sweaters.
Wasn’t the sandwich named after the Earl of Sandwich? Or is that an urban legend? Also it doesn’t answer the question of who or what the Earl is named after.
“malapropism” (saying the wrong word to hilarious effect) is named after a character prone such such slips of the tongue, named Mrs. Malaprop, in a 1775 comedy called “The Rivals.”
I was amused to learn that the French word for garbage can, “poubelle,” comes from a person: Eugène Poubelle, the 19th-century Parisian prefect who first demanded they be used to dispose of household trash. Link. (in French)
The orrery is named for the Earl of Orrery–which is strange because it sounds like exactly the kind of word you might make up to describe such an object.
It’s a grey area, since it’s human name but not an actual person, but the word ‘Gun’ comes from “Lady Gunilda” aka “Domina Gunilda”,a ballista ( very large crossbow ).
Can the name itself, ‘Malaprop’ be translated as something to do with bad choice of words (‘Mal’ meaning ‘bad’ or ‘evil’)? Which would make it a life-word imitating art-name imitating life-word
Yes, actually, malapropros, roughly, “inappropriate” in French, was the source of the name. However, “malapropism” entered the English language through the play.
Which is actually pretty damn funny for a play written in 1775. I recommend it.