5 Words You Didn’t Know Came from Famous Authors

By Sarah Warren on September 13, 2016

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We all know better than to write how we talk. When writing a college paper, we abandon our conversational tones, casual language, and roundabout speaking patterns. We use bigger words—words we would never use in conversation. So where do these big, essay-words like “draconian” and conversational colloquialisms come from? Unsurprisingly, a lot of them originate from literary figures. These weird word origins might make you think twice when you bulk up your vocabulary for that next paper. Here are 5 Words You Didn’t Know Came from Famous Authors:

Blatant
Current meaning: utterly obvious.

The first of our weird word origins began as a thousand-tongued beast straight from the depths of Hades. The word was first used in Edmund Spencer’s “The Faerie Queene,” referring to the Blatant Beast, which represented slander and wicked gossip (hence the thousand tongues.) Such was the allegory’s popularity that British citizens began referring to unsavory personalities as “blatant beasts.” By the late 1600s, the word came to describe a vulgar gossip. Even today, it maintains a negative connotation—you’ll rarely hear someone describe a situation as “blatantly splendid.”

Addiction
Current meaning: a strong dependency on something

One of the few words on this that has always meant what it does now, addiction first appeared in Shakespeare’s Henry V, Act I, Scene I. Ely Canterbury says, “Since his addiction was to courses vain, his companies unletter’d, rude and shallow.” Basically, without Shakespeare, E! News would have a lot less to say about celebrities.

Bedazzled
Current meaning: pleasantly stunned or dazed (or covered in rhinestones, if you’re twelve.)

Every preteen’s favorite pastime! Shakespeare invented this one, too, introducing it in The Taming of the Shrew, Act IV, Scene V, though not as an adjective (e.g., “My mistaking eyes have been so dazed with the sun that everything I look on seemeth bedazzled.”) Instead, Shakespeare gave the word the meaning it still holds today—before the reign of glitter guns. The real quote, said by Katharina, reads, “Pardon, old father, my mistaking eyes, that have been so bedazzled with the sun that everything I look on seemeth green.”

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Hazard
Current meaning: something dangerous or risky.

Hazard began as a popular game of dice. Originating in Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales,” it was less of a word than a title similar to Yahtzee. The rules are complicated, but they boil down to one person casting the dice and other players betting on the outcome of the roll. Eventually, due mostly to the negative reputation of gamblers, the word evolved to mean any risk, not just those involving dice.

Nerd
Current meaning: an overly-intellectual person

Here’s a word that was invented with no (known) intended meaning. Our final weird word origin comes from none other than Dr. Seuss. He used “nerd” in a series of nonsense words in his book, If I Ran the Zoo. Unfortunately, the other words—It-Kutch, Preep, Proo, Nerkle, and Seersucker—did not catch on. How the word gained its present meaning is unclear. According to unverifiable sources—and Wikipedia—it was invented by a Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute student and just caught on. Oral tradition claims the word was originally spelled “knurd”—“drunk” backwards—and was used to describe young people who studied instead of partying. So, if we combine written intent with oral tradition, a nerd is an animal who studies a lot—a bookworm! Maybe Seuss was onto something after all…

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