Shakespeare is credited with introducing thousands of words and phrases into the English language, including “bedroom”, “majestic” and “eyeballs”.
“So, then, two bosoms and a single troth. Then by your side no bedroom me deny, For lying so, Hermia, I do not lie.” – A Midsummer Night’s Dream
“This is a most majestic vision, and Harmonious charmingly. ” – The Tempest
“Hold up thy head.
Look in mine eyeballs, there thy beauty lies.
Then why not lips in lips, since eyes in eyes?” – Venus and Adonis
You might have heard of the Linux distribution “Ubuntu”.
Ubuntu is in fact a word from the African language Xhosa. It expresses a profound concept of there being a shared understanding and humanity that exists between people. The concept extends beyond Xhosa, resonating in various Bantu languages across Africa.
Did you know that in Thai, the number 5 is pronounced as “ha”? People have embraced this and commonly use “555” as an expression for laughter online.
The term “nerd” originated in Dr. Seuss’s 1950 book, “If I Ran the Zoo”. In the book, the narrator mentions collecting “a Nerkle, a Nerd, and a seersucker too” as exhibits for the fictional zoo.
While the term initially had somewhat negative connotations, it has since evolved and is used more neutrally to describe people with a strong passion for intellectual or academic pursuits.
The word “Fernweh” emerges from the fusion of two German words, ‘fern’, denoting ‘far’, ‘distant’, and ‘weh’ translating to ‘sore’ or ‘pained’. It describes the inexplicable longing for places yet unexplored.
“Cafuné” is a term of Brazilian Portuguese origin that describes the tender act of running one’s fingers through the hair of a loved one.
“Mångata” is a Swedish word that poetically describes the reflection of moonlight on the ocean’s surface. It is a combination of the words “mån” (moon) and “gata” (road), almost as if it were a road to the moon. 🌕
In Swedish there exists a beautiful word – ‘Gökotta’. This word describes the act of waking up early to experience the first bird song outside in nature.
”L’esprit de l’escalier” is a French term that refers to the universal phenomenon of thinking of a clever response or comeback too late, usually after a conversation or argument has already ended.
The term literally means “the spirit of the stairs”, as it would typically happen between neighbours bumping into each other in the stairwell of their Paris apartment block.
Can you remember an occasion in which you had the perfect comeback too late?
The Inca civilisation had a unique method for record-keeping. They used knotted strings called ‘quipus’.
Believed to be a blend of accounting and storytelling, quipus were not only used for census records and calendrical data but also for recording historical events, stories and even numeric values.