Unless you mix it with some harder stuff, there’s no booze to be found in a typical can, bottle, or mug of root beer. So why do we call it “root beer” instead of a seemingly more accurate alternative such as “root soda”? The answer is twofold — it has ties to how it was once prepared, and it relates more directly to a bit of 19th-century marketing.

First, let’s touch upon the “root” aspect of the drink’s name. Root beer’s distinct flavor is thanks to the root of the sassafras tree, which was once a key ingredient. However, the root was banned by the FDA in 1960 over fears it caused cancer. While that root has since been replaced by artificially flavored syrups, the name stuck.

As for the “beer” part of the name, some early root beers did have trace amounts of alcohol. This was because yeast was sometimes added to produce a foamy head, which was desirable in glasses of lager. The yeast fermented over time, leading to root beers having a very low alcohol content.

But the true popularity of the term “root beer” is owed to Philadelphia-based pharmacist Charles Elmer Hires. He’s regarded as an early pioneer of commercial root beer, though he considered naming it “root tea.” He switched the name to “root beer” in an effort to market it to Pennsylvania coal miners.

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The Hires Root Beer Co. even held the rights to the “root beer” name until 1879, when Congress passed a now-repealed law declaring that no word in the dictionary could be registered as intellectual property. Based on the success of Hires’ operation, other drink manufacturers began marketing their beverages as root beer by the late 19th century.

Which word made you slip up the most during grade-school spelling tests? One that confuses a lot of folks is “Wednesday,” the only day of the week with a silent letter. While the spelling seems like it was invented to trick kindergarteners, there’s actually a perfectly good reason “Wednesday” is spelled with a silent “d” in the middle. It comes from the Old English Wōdnesdæg (“Woden’s day”), reflecting the ancient Germanic practice of naming the days of the week after prominent gods — in this case, Woden (also known as Odin). 

As it turns out, other strange English spellings also have good reasons for looking so, well, wrong. Whether staying true to ancient roots or hearkening back to surprising origin stories, these words have fascinating stories to tell with their spelling.

Noun: One that takes the lead or initiative; an indicator of trends.

“Bellwether” is often used in a sense of forecasting, as in, “This state is a bellwether for national elections.” Because of this, it’s frequently misspelled as “bellweather,” forming a connection to weather forecasting. Additionally, “wether” itself is a very uncommon (at least in modern usage) English word — it refers to a castrated male sheep. But this definition is precisely where the term “bellwether” originated.

“Bellwether” comes from the Middle English term bellewether or belleweder, referring to said castrated sheep wearing a bell around its neck, encouraging other sheep to follow it. This was the leader of the flock. By the 15th century, the term’s literal sense had diminished and transformed into a metaphorical term for a leader, trendsetter, or indicator.

Noun: A rank of a commissioned officer in the army, air force, or marine corps.

Certain military rankings have complex spellings. “Lieutenant” and “brigadier general” are mouthfuls, but they can be parsed out fairly easily by their spelling. But “colonel” — pronounced “kernel” — strays from the conventional rules of English spelling. In fact, it’s the only common English word with an “l” pronounced as an “r.”

This curious case of spelling results from the influence of two foreign languages: French and Italian. When the Italian word colonello was adopted into French, it became coronel and its pronunciation changed. Later, a spelling variant that reflects its Italian roots, colonel, became popular, but by then, the pronounced “r” was well established, resulting in a French pronunciation with an Italian spelling.

Adjective: Bright and glowing as a result of fluorescence; very bright in color.

“Fluorescent” is an adjective describing something that emits light brightly, such as the fluorescent lights in a shopping mall. It originates from the noun “fluorescence,” which was coined during the 19th century by physicist Sir George G. Stokes, who first observed the glowing phenomenon in the mineral fluorite.

While a more common English spelling pattern would pair the vowels as “ou” instead of “uo,” the mineral, sometimes called “fluorspar,” was named after the Latin fluor, meaning “a flow,” from fluere, meaning “to flow.” 

Noun: Any of a genus (Fuchsia) of ornamental shrubs of the evening-primrose family; a vivid reddish purple.

Not all color names are as easy to spell as “red” and “green” — take “chartreuse” and “ochre.” Another sneaky name that breaks from English spelling norms is “fuchsia,” pronounced “FYOO-shuh.” Frequently misspelled as “fuschia” or “fushia,” the correct spelling (“fuchsia”) features a rare “chs” consonant combination.

While English does employ the vowel pair “ch” to sound like “sh” sometimes, as seen in “parachute” and “crochet,” it’s rarely followed by an “s.” This noun’s unique spelling came about because the term was named after Leonhart Fuchs, a German botanist. The oldest version of the term referred to the genus of plants, and it became Fuchsia after the Fuchs surname. The color was named after the plant.  

Noun: A person who writes plays.

Famous playwrights such as William Shakespeare are best known for doing just that: writing plays. So why, then, isn’t it spelled “playwrite”? The use of “wright” is no accident — it’s been spelled this way since the term was coined in Middle English. It refers to “a worker skilled in the manufacture, especially of wooden objects,” such as a “shipwright.”

In Middle English, “wright” also meant “builder” or “architect,” not just a woodworker. It comes from the Old English wyrhta or wryhta, meaning “worker” or “maker.” So, a playwright is literally a builder of plays. The term emphasizes the craftsmanship, not just the act of writing.

Verb: To make a transition without interruption from one activity, topic, scene, or part to another.

Often misspelled and mispronounced, “segue” was originally a musical term (“proceed to what follows without pause”) that has become a common word for transitioning to something new. Pronounced “seg-way,” it can confound even native English speakers because the vowel duo “ue” does not traditionally sound like “way.” Further compounding the confusion, the word “way” itself seems to support the definition, indicating a path or transition.

However, there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation for the spelling of “segue”: The original musical term comes from the Italian word seguire, meaning “to follow.” Per Italian pronunciation norms, the verb combination “ue” is often pronounced “way.” Perhaps capitalizing on the spelling-pronunciation mismatch, the American brand Segway produces two-wheeled transportation devices that act as a segue between landmarks during sightseeing tours. 

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Verb: To cause to be set aside; to force out of use as inferior.

“Supersede” (pronounced “SOO-per-seed”) has superseded many older spelling variations of the word. It first came from the Latin supersedēre, literally meaning “to sit on top of” (sedēre means “to sit”) but also “to be superior to” or “to refrain from.” In Middle English, the word transformed into “superceden,” a synonym for “defer.” While the correct spelling in modern English is “supersede” — preserving the Latin spelling — an alternative, “supercede,” is fairly common and listed as an acceptable variant in the dictionary.

This variation likely comes from the English spelling practice of ending words with “-cede,” as in “precede,” “recede,” and “concede.” “Supersede” is the only common English word that ends with the suffix “-sede,” making writers think twice when sounding it out. 

Some words sound inherently modern, as if they could have been invented in the last few decades alongside smartphones, social media, 3D printing, and self-driving cars. But step into the world of etymology and more often than not, you’ll find words with ancient histories. Even the most modern-sounding words — those we use frequently in our fast-paced, technologically driven world — can have origins in times long gone, sometimes as far back as Old English and the tongues of classical antiquity. Here, we look at eight words that feel contemporary but have surprisingly ancient roots. 

Whether talking about computers or pandemics, the word “virus” has plenty of context — often negative — in our modern world. Perhaps the only positive association is “going viral,” something that many would-be influencers strive to achieve. That usage is newer, but the word “virus” itself has been around for a long time. It goes back to classical Latin, in which vīrus refers to a poisonous secretion or venom, or potentially anything with a virulent or malignant quality. “Virus” entered the English language in 1599 in the context of a poisonous venom, while “viral,” meaning “caused by a virus,” emerged much later in the 1930s. 

Long before the existence of the social media platform we now call X, the word “twitter” appeared in late 14th-century Middle English. It began as “twiteren,” meaning “to chirp or make small, tremulous sounds,” in reference to birds. Birds have long since twittered in many literary works, including James Thomson’s poem “Autumn”: “With other kindred birds of season, there / They twitter cheerful, till the vernal months / Invite them welcome back.” 

Before cars, stock markets, and computers began crashing, “crash” emerged as an onomatopoeic word in the late 14th century, first written as “crasschen,” meaning “to break into pieces or make a loud, clattering sound.” And prior to car crashes, people crashed horses, such as in Charles Kingsley’s 1866 novel Hereward the Wake, in which “two other knights crashed their horses through the brushwood.” 

The dating app Tinder popularized the modern swipe, with its “swipe right to like, swipe left to pass” functionality — something the app’s co-founder came up with while in the shower. The word “swipe,” however, has been around for at least two centuries. In 1825, “swipe” was used in Scottish as “to move circularly” or “to give a stroke in a semicircular or elliptical form.” It soon after appeared in English, meaning “to strike at” or “deal a swinging blow,” often in relation to the English sport of cricket. A more modern usage of swiping a credit card first appeared in 1986, according to the Oxford English Dictionary.  

Today, if someone is referred to as a gamer, it probably means they play video games — or, if they’re more old-school, tabletop role-playing games. But gamers are nothing new. The word has been used since Middle English to refer to anyone who frequently takes part in a game or sport, or a person who plays games for stakes — in other words, a gambler. This latter sense was often frowned upon. In J. H. Ingraham’s 1845 short story “The Key; Or the Pack of Cards,” we are told, “The gamer is farther from restoration even than the drunkard, because what he does he does in the light of sobriety.” 

Surveys indicate the average American may spend up to 10 hours a day online. That’s a big chunk of time spent browsing — and an impressively impactful feat for a word that’s been around since the 15th century. “Browse” originally referred to the way in which animals feed on buds or eat leaves from trees, or the manner in which cattle graze. The pastoral meaning was extended to the perusal of books in the early 1800s and later found its way into modern internet parlance. 

The modern usage of “sick” to mean “outstandingly or amazingly good or impressive” is a prime example of amelioration — a type of semantic change in which words with negative or neutral associations improve in meaning and develop positive connotations. “Sick” itself goes all the way back to the Old English word séoc, referring to suffering from illness of any kind, or being generally unwell or ailing. The word bravely hung on to its original sense for centuries, until skateboarders and surfers decided to radically invert its meaning in the 1980s. 

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The sheer dread of being unfriended on social media is one of the modern world’s greatest woes. Some small succor can perhaps be found, however, in the knowledge that unfriending is nothing new. “Unfriend” as a noun has existed since at least the 13th century, referring to someone who is not a friend or on friendly terms, or possibly an enemy. As a verb — and more aligned with the modern meaning — we can find an example in a 1659 letter by Thomas Fuller, in which he wrote, “I hope, Sir, that we are not mutually un-friended by this difference which hath happened betwixt us.”