Grab Bag for Word Nerds, Part One: Language Gone Wrong: Words That Started Out as Errors

Language change is driven by mistakes. If every generation of children learned perfectly what they heard spoken around them, then languages would be exact duplicates of themselves, stretching years into the past. But this isn't what happens. Errors, mishearings, inversion of sounds, dropping and adding of sounds, all these phenomena and more drive historical language change. You'll find a few of these systematic inconsistencies that result in other word forms below, as well as singular instances that don't fit a pattern where linguists can pinpoint exactly what went "wrong."
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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. algorithm
    a precise rule specifying how to solve some problem
    The spreadsheet uses algorithms to estimate the number of hours that will be required to draw, build, finish and pack a table.
    —New York Times (May 12, 2014)
    The Medieval Latin source for this word, algorismus is actually a very bad transliteration of the name of the Arab mathematician who helped introduce higher math to the western world. His surname was al-Khwarizmi which in turn is derived from a place name.
  2. ammunition
    projectiles to be fired from a gun
    Separatists quickly armed themselves, while hundreds of saboteurs and provocateurs with weapons and ammunition entered Ukraine from Russia.
    —BusinessWeek (May 9, 2014)
    It is common to misanalyze an article which precedes a word as part of that word. Here the word la munition was misanalyzed so the "a" of the article became part of the word, becoming l'ammunition.
  3. archipelago
    a group of many islands in a large body of water
    This archipelago of 115 islands in the Indian Ocean now has one of the world’s most expensive hotels.
    —New York Times (May 6, 2014)
    The etymology of archipelago seems like it should be from Greek arkhi meaning "chief" and pelagos "sea." But this form never occurs in ancient Greek, and the modern form is borrowed from Italian, with the intended meaning being "the Aegean Sea." If that's the case, then the archi- in archipelago is actually a corrupted version of Aigaion, which is how you say "Aegean" in Greek.
  4. varsity
    a team representing a high school, college, or university
    He coached girls’ basketball at Trinity Washington University and boys’ junior varsity at Poolesville before coaching the Jaguars’ girls team.
    —Washington Post (May 6, 2014)
    This originated as versity, a short form of university, until the vowel changed for unknown reasons. The cause may be mysterious, but there are numerous examples that are similar, including varmint from vermin, showing the change can go in the opposite direction as well.
  5. squeeze
    press firmly
    Water flows in the same way it flows into the cell, then gets squeezed mechanically out.
    —Scientific American (May 8, 2014)
    Sometimes changes in words are influenced by the (unconscious) sense that words that mean the same should sound similar. That's what linguists think happen with squeeze. There is a form quease, from an Old English root, but linguists figure the initial "s" came about from speakers drawing an analogy between this word and all the other similar words that begin with "squ-": squash and squat most obviously, but also perhaps squirm and squelch.
  6. sashay
    walk with a lofty proud gait, often to impress others
    At Blumarine, models sashayed down a white furry carpet in slashed cocktail dresses which showed a thin layer of lace covering visible skin beneath.
    —Reuters (Feb 21, 2014)
    This word is actually mistake-ridden rendering of the French chassé "gliding step" from a verb that means "to chase". The "sh" and "s" sounds got shuffled from the original.
  7. tornado
    a violently destructive windstorm occurring over land
    The winds from the tornado, which reached speeds of 200 miles per hour, destroyed roughly half the businesses in the town.
    —New York Times (May 7, 2014)
    From Spanish for "thunderstorm", tronada. The inversion of two sounds, in this case the "r" and the "o", is a well-documented process known as metathesis, which is historically also responsible for turning brids into birds , beorht into bright and helped turn a luchorpan into a leprechaun, among many others.
  8. burst
    come open suddenly and violently
    A stroke occurs when bloodflow to part of the brain is blocked by a clot or a burst blood vessel.
    —Reuters (May 8, 2014)
    This is another clear instance of metathesis, because the Proto-Germanic root is brest. At some point, the "r" sound jumped ahead in the word and the spelling followed suit.
  9. mace
    a ceremonial staff carried as a symbol of office
    Known as the "Spice Island", it is the world's second-largest producer of nutmeg and is a significant producer of mace, cinnamon, ginger and cloves.
    —BBC (Feb 20, 2013)
    The origin here is from French macis. The "s" was mistaken for a plural marker and dropped, something that has also happened historically to cherry (from Greek kerasos), riddle (from Old English rædels), and recently to kudos, giving kudo.
  10. auger
    a hand tool used to bore holes
    Out on the tundra of frozen lake, the guys from Fargo use an ice auger with its rotating blades to drill a hole.
    —New York Times (Apr 22, 2014)
    The original name of the tool was a nauger , but it was misheard as an auger, so the word lost its inital "n." Linguists call this process "misanalysis."
  11. syllabus
    a summary or outline of what will be covered in an academic course
    In each class, your syllabus provided you with all the details you needed to succeed.
    —Forbes (May 18, 2014)
    The Latin word the English derives from is a misreading of the Greek word sittybos, so the mistake is not an English one, but a mistake lies at the heart of the history of this word nonetheless.
  12. assassin
    a murderer, especially of a prominent political figure
    In 1999's "The World Is Not Enough," it was hard to tell which plot — the assassin's or the film's — fell apart faster.
    —Los Angeles Times (May 16, 2014)
    The "in" in this word is a plural marker mistaken for part of the root, making "assassins" technically redundant.
  13. genius
    unusual mental ability
    At the age of 77 that precocious genius Sir Isaac Newton lost his shirt in the South Sea Bubble.
    —Forbes (Jun 4, 2014)
    As a word of Latin origin, the Latin plural would be genii, but geniuses tend to have enough trouble socially without insisting on this being the correct form of the plural...
  14. culprit
    someone or something responsible for harm or wrongdoing
    They were suspected to be the likely culprits behind the attack on Wednesday, although no group immediately claimed responsibility.
    —New York Times (May 28, 2014)
    Not a word, but a misreading of a French phrase used in the court room: Culpable: (prest d'averrer nostre bille), which translates to "Guilty, ready (to prove our case)" something the prosecutor would say that was abbreviated cul.prit and mistaken for an English way to address the defendant.
  15. aborigine
    an indigenous person who was born in a particular place
    She points out that apart from Australia's aborigine population everyone here has immigrant roots.
    —BBC (Aug 31, 2013)
    The "s" in the Latin source, aborigines was mistaken for a plural marker, and removed to produce this singular. The proper singular is aboriginal.
  16. crescent
    having a curved shape that tapers at the ends
    Over the years numerous other Southwest paintings resembling a crescent moon and star were discovered, and experts quickly linked them with the Crab supernova.
    —Scientific American (Jan 16, 2014)
    Ultimately from a Latin root meaning to "thrive or swell". It was in this sense that it was applied to the phase of the moon known to English speakers as a waxing moon. This reference to a phase of the moon was mistaken for a reference to the shape itself and has referred to the shape ever since.
  17. data
    a collection of facts from which conclusions may be drawn
    The utilities have asked for an extended deadline on their report about flood risks because they didn’t receive key flood data from the U.S.
    —Washington Times (May 19, 2014)
    Often used in the singular, this word is actually a plural, the singular being datum.
  18. effigy
    a representation of a person
    He had converted a Scrooge puppet he had made for World Book Day into an effigy of Michael Gove.
    —BBC (Mar 26, 2014)
    From Latin effigies the "s" was again mistaken for a plural and removed.
  19. pariah
    a person who is rejected from society or home
    Americans abroad can be pariahs shunned by banks for daily banking activities.
    —Forbes (May 3, 2014)
    The source is a plural word form ultimately from Tamil, a language of India, paraiyar, which means "drummers." The connection here is that most of those who played the drums were social outcasts.
  20. graffiti
    unauthorized drawings or writing on walls in public places
    But graffiti usually turns out to be costly for everyone, as taxpayers ultimately pay the bill to have the designs erased.
    —Washington Times (May 16, 2014)
    This word is actually a plural, with the singular being graffito.
Created on Mon May 12 15:09:55 EDT 2014 (updated Sun Jan 12 22:35:31 EST 2020)

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