French | Stephanie Huesler

Tag Archives: French

April 29, 2026 · 11:40 AM

Etymology Undusted: French Borrowings

Languages are constantly moving, changing their minds on the meanings of words, and taking on new words to fit their needs in a fast-paced world. Today, when we say nice, we mean agreeable, pleasant, or kind; but when it first entered English in the late 13^th century, it meant foolish, frivolous, ignorant or senseless. By Jane Austen’s time, the word was disdained as overused, diffused to the point of meaning nothing… a nice day, a nice walk, a nice person. And depending on the tone, it can be sarcastic. A versatile, everyday word that we stole – uh, borrowed – from Old French.

English has borrowed quite a bit from French; in fact, some linguists estimate that up to 45% of English words can trace their origins back to French. Most of the influx into English came after William the Conqueror’s 1066 victory, when the French-speaking ruling class (of what we know today as England) moved in. To communicate with their new tyrants – uh, rulers – the conquered Anglo-Saxons needed to do some rapid assimilation, and ended up expanding their vocabulary by leaps and bounds. In the end, it’s up for debate as to who actually conquered whom, as English is spoken the world over by more than a billion people as a first or second language.

We can be gracious winners, and give the French tongue credit where crédit is due (it’s French, after all). Aside from words stol— borrowed centuries ago and adapted to fit our tongue, we have also assimilated purely French words or phrases that we use regularly:

Rendezvous, RSVP (répondez s’il vous plaît), arrangez-vous, mis en place, café, résumé, faux pas, déjà vu, à la carte, cliché, cuisine, sauté, avant-garde, chic, je ne sais quoi, cul-de-sac, en route, savoir-faire, carte blanche, boutique, lingerie, silhouette, matinée, décor, fiancé, and augment. To scrape the tip of the iceberg.

With up to 40-45% of English being French in origin, chances are that many more of the words I’ve just used to communicate this piece were originally French. Can you spot them? Please comment below!

9 Comments

Filed under Etymology, Grammar, History Undusted, Liguistics, Linguistics, Lists, Nuts & Bolts

Tagged as 1066, AI-Gen Image, Anglo-Saxons, Borrowed Words, Borrowings, English, Etymology, French, History, Language, Linguistics, William the Conqueror, writing

April 23, 2025 · 10:00 AM

Etymology Undusted: Ducks and Drakes

Today’s phrase, playing at / making ducks and drakes, refers to skipping stones across a water surface, much like the image of a waterbird coming in for a watery landing. By 1614, the meaning had come to be associated with squandering or throwing one’s money away needlessly, much like stones were tossed away in stone-skipping.

The first written evidence of the phrase was in 1585, The nomenclator, or remembrancer of Adrianus Junius, translated by John Higgins:

“A kind of sport or play with an oister shell or stone throwne into the water, and making circles yer it sinke, etc. It is called a ducke and a drake, and a halfe-penie cake.”

These two terms also appear in nursery rhymes; the first, found in A History of Nursery Rhymes (1899) by Percy B. Green, where he mentions that this rhyme was repeated when skimming stones:

A duck, a drake, a barley cake,
A penny to pay the baker;
A hop, a scotch, another notch –
Slitherum, slitherum, take her.

The “barley cake” is “halfpenny cake” in this 1916 version of The Real Mother Goose:

A duck and a drake,
And a halfpenny cake,
With a penny to pay the old baker.
A hop and a scotch
Is another notch,
Slitherum, slatherum, take her.

In 1626, it is mentioned in the play Dick of Devon: “The poorest ship-boy Might on the Thames make duckes and drakes with pieces Of eight fetchd out of Spayne.”

Many cultures share the simple pastime of stone tossing, with their own terms for it: American English, skipping stones; British English, skimming stones or ducks and drakes; in Scottish, Skiting or Skliffing; in Irish, stone skiffing. In French, making ricochets (faire des ricochets); in German, stone flitting (Steinehüpfen); in various languages such as Bulgarian, Greek, Latvian and Lithuanian, their terms refer to frogs rather than ducks. In Japanese, cutting water. In Norwegian, fish bounce (fiskesprett). In Portuguese, either water shearing (capar a água) or making tiny hats (fazer chapeletas). The list goes on and on!

The oldest reference to the pastime goes back to the 2^nd century AD by the Greek scholar Julius Pollux; in the 3^rd century, Marcus Minucius Felix (a Latin writer) mentions children skipping shells on the beach.

Today, of course, it has become a serious competition for some. According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the record for the number of skips is 88, held by Kurt Steiner; the furthest distance for men is 121.8m, made by Scotsman Dougie Isaacs, and 52.5m for women, thrown by Nina Luginbuhl from Switzerland.

The next time you’re out at a lake or shore, toss a stone and remember the long and colourful history of ducks, drakes, frogs, fish, hats and water!