Yet another word stupidity: vinegar

[cjsmith]

French "vinegar" = vinaigre.
French "wine" = vin.
French "sour" = aigre.

What happens to wine when it goes bad? WHY DID I NOT SEE HOW THEY MADE THAT WORD? It's not like I don't know every one of these words in French, and it's not like I've never in my life heard anything about wine.

I picked up this little gem while reading my chemistry textbook last night. (They're discussing acetic acid. Acetum: Latin, soured.)

The more stuff like this I notice, the more I think I need to turn in my interested-in-languages card. Obviously I ignore the topic almost completely.

Comments

Re: Northern European epithets

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Oh, I get it now! I think you're saying that most people who are using it are using it to show off their knowledge. And yeah, I wouldn't at all be surprised if that were the case.