Essay:Surprising Dates of Origin for Terms
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One can learn history simply by skimming a dictionary that has the origination of terms. But there are many surprises. Add to our growing list:
| New Term | Origin date | Comments |
|---|---|---|
| Biblical | 1780-1790 | It's hard to imagine such a late date of origin. Perhaps the word became necessary as an increasing number of people turned away from the authority of the Bible? |
| bill of rights | 1798 | Wow: that's many years after it was added to the Constitution! |
| diploma | 1702 | The term "diploma" seems to be an invention of atheistic sentiments in the Enlightenment, and unrelated to scholarly achievement or even the development of the universities hundreds of years earlier |
| fission | 1617 | Looks like nuclear fission is not a new idea after all! |
| flagpole | 1884 | What did flags hang on for centuries before that? |
| hello | 1889 | What was the prior greeting? Is this surprisingly late date of origin due to the invention of the telephone? |
| landlord | before 1100s | Think landlord problems are new? This is one of the very oldest words in the English language. That revelation then opens one's eyes to what the word really is: Lord of the land, in the feudal system. |
| pole vault | 1890 | Apparently this was not a recognized athletic field event much before the revival of the Olympics in 1896. |
| separation of church and state | 1802 | More than ten years after the adoption of the First Amendment, the least Christian of the early presidents (Thomas Jefferson) used the phrase for the first time in an appeasing letter to Baptists. (It's also important to note that he used the term to assure them that their religious rights took precedence over the government--not the other way around.) The Supreme Court did not endorse this phrase until the liberal Justice Hugo Black used the term in 1947 (Everson v. Board of Education). (The Court also quoted from the Jefferson without endorsing the phrase in the 1879 polygamy case of Reynolds v. United States). |
| theism | 1678 | Nearly a hundred years after "atheism" (1587). Perhaps such an obvious position that no word was required until atheism became more widespread? |
| worldwide | 1632 | Did people really think in terms of the entire world nearly 400 years ago? Apparently so. |
