Out of ideas this Halloween? Why not try a Zero Effort Halloween Costume! It’s the least you could do.
Author: Ryan Starkey
Thanks, it has pockets!
[Image description: the Greek creator goddess Gaia complements the Australian goddess Eingana on her new animal, a kangaroo. Eigana relies “Thanks, it has pockets!”] I like to imagine all the creator goddesses from every polytheistic religion hang out together and are friends. Eingana is specifically a Jawoyn goddess from northern Australia. She is a goddess […]
Etymonopoly: A Free Print-and-Play Game for Language Lovers
A meme I made has been turned into a playable board game! First here’s images of the board and cards. Scroll down for the printable PDFs! A bit of backstory: A while ago I had a silly idea that would leave me alone until I made it: “what if monopoly, but linguistics?”. The basic idea: […]
The Etymology of English Colours
❤️Red, 💚green, 🩶grey and 🤎brown just evolved fairly simply from Proto-Indo-European colour names, with their meanings unchanged in the last 6000 or so years of evolution. The only twist being that “green” and “grey” seem to be from the same root.. There is no clear explanation for this, although something similar seems to have happened […]
Unexpected doublets: how “merry”, “bra”, and “pretzel” are related
Did you know the word “merry” is related to the words “bra” and “pretzel”? Well now you do. A quick rundown of each of these words: ⭐Although these days its pretty localised to the holiday season, “merry” used to be a fairly general word meaning “happy” or “pleasant”. It comes from a Proto-Germanic word which […]
Dragons at the start of the Dance of the Dragons
[Spoiler warning for season 1 of House of the Dragon, no spoilers for season 2] I’m a huge A Song of Ice and Fire fan, but watching House of the Dragon, I sometimes find myself losing track of the various dragons and their riders, so I’ve made this helpful cheat-sheet. It shows every dragon at […]
The Etymology and Name evolution of Alston, Cumbria
Todays post is something bit different and perhaps a bit niche, but I’d like to share an image about the name evolution of my hometown, Alston. Alston has a population of only about 1000 people, and is nestled among the hills of the North Pennines in Cumbria, England. It is England’s highest town, and probably […]
Indo-European Words for ‘Tongue’
My newest image using this template, here’s the word for “tongue” in 64 living Indo-European languages, and a bunch of dead ones. If it doesn’t look HD, try clicking on it to open the image in a new window: This is my second image in this style. For the previous one, in which I go […]
Eight British and Irish Accent Maps
Eight maps to show how the differences in how vowels are pronounced in Britain and Ireland. Explanations of each map below: Map 1: Rhoticity Rhoticity in English refers to whether or not an “r” is pronounced when it isn’t before a vowel.For example, in rhotic accents, the word “arm” has a true “r” sound in […]
Indo-European Words for ‘Name’
I’ve created a huge tree to show the relationship between 64 living Indo-European languages, and many dead or extinct ones.With this template I’m planning on making a series of images to show how various words in these languages have shared etymologies. This is the first image in that series: words for “name”. If it doesn’t […]