It's possible
that the acronym began as a mnemonic (it's not an easy word to remember how to
spell) but somewhere along the line that was forgotten and it got taken as the
word's origin. That's unlikely anyway, since using acronyms as words is a
relatively modern phenomenon.
Folk
etymology is everywhere, though, and people will insist on telling you
completely invented origins for words which they believe implicitly. Another
often claimed to be an acronym is news,
for North East West South (presumably because the more common order would
result in the word nsew). In fact,
it's more prosaic than that. The word quite literally means "new things",
as when we ask someone "What's new?"
It's very
easy, too, to make assumptions about words that seem similar, especially when
the meanings are compatible too, but that doesn't always prove a connection.
The number of possible sound-combinations isn't infinite, and some will appear
in languages all over the world. The problem is, they've often come to that
point by very different routes.
A while ago,
someone on an online forum claimed that the word devil is (not might be, but is) related to the Sanskrit word devi, meaning a lesser god. On the face
of it, that's entirely possible: it wouldn't be the only time the gods of one
religion have been turned into the devils of another.
Except that
it isn't true. A brief look at the history of devil shows that it comes from the Old English deofol, and that derives from the Latin diabolus and the Greek diabolos,
from which we get diabolic (trust me: b and f really are closely related
sounds). The original word means an accuser or slanderer, and clearly has no
connection with the Sanskrit word.
This kind of
thing even happens within the same language. It can produce good puns: for
instance, if we think of rock music as something to do with stones (as Dylan
said, everybody — especially rock musicians — must get stoned). However, where
rock as in stone comes from French roche and
Latin rocca, rock meaning sway (which
is how the music got its name) is a Germanic word, roccian in Old English. No connection whatsoever.
On the other
hand, the opposite can sometimes happen, and the most bizarre links can exist
between apparently unconnected versions of the same letter-jumble. One of my
favourites is check. This has
numerous different meanings: to make sure something's OK, to stop something's
progress, a pattern of squares or (spelt cheque here in Britain) a bank's promissory
note, as well as several others.
Which makes
it more surprising that they all derive from exactly the same source: the
Persian word for king, usually rendered as shah.
It entered the English language via its use in chess — when you call out check, you're essentially saying
"look to your king", while checkmate
means "the king is dead". All the other meanings are ultimately
references to or metaphors for some aspect of chess or of putting the king in
check.
This happened
because words change their meanings through the centuries, sometimes causing
confusion. We all know, and usually accept without thought, the saying
"the exception that proves the rule", without considering that it's
absurd. After all, an exception to a rule challenges the rule, rather than
confirms it.
But that's
precisely what the saying really means. The word prove used to mean test (it's still found in that sense in military
proving grounds) and the expression means that an exception tests whether a
rule is still valid — not a confirmation, but still a valuable scientific
process.
For example,
we have a rule that says "An object will fall to the ground when it's suspended
in mid-air." "Ah," someone objects, "but when I threw a
stone, it went up, not down." You then explain at length the precise difference
between suspending and throwing, possibly demonstrating both with the objector.
The rule is neither tested nor affected.
"Ah,"
says someone else, "but I suspended (not threw) a balloon in the air, and
that floated up."
This is a
much more valid objection, and we actually have to rephrase the rule to say
"An object that's heavier than air will fall to the ground when it's
suspended in mid-air." The original rule has been proved in the old sense,
but definitely not proved in the new sense.
Ultimately,
of course, it's not a big deal if someone misunderstands the origin of a word.
The problem is the internet. The flip-side of having all the information we
might need at our fingertips is that it's not all true, and once something's
been stated as fact online, it can be incredibly difficult to convince people
that they shouldn't believe it.
There's a
very simple answer to this: get a good dictionary, whether it's on your
bookshelf or on your computer. And I mean a GOOD dictionary, not joebloggsonlinedikshonary.com.
Something like the Oxford or Collins Dictionaries (or I imagine Merriam Webster if you're in
America) will give the source of each word, as far as it's known, at the end of
the entry. Five minutes with the Concise Oxford Dictionary would have told you
everything I've put in this article, and a great deal more.
You too can
be an etymologist, instead of a folk etymologist.
