• Lvxferre@mander.xyz
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    1
    ·
    edit-2
    13 days ago

    I have some fun etymological trivia related to that.

    Late Proto-Indo-European had a root typically reconstructed as *kakka-. It means “to shit” or “shit”. It’s imitative in nature so not exactly a “fancy” word, right off the bat; more like a “child-friendly vulgarism”.

    That root is still present in Armenian (k’ak’), Russian (kakat’), Lithuanian (kaka), the Romance languages (cacare/cagar/etc.), the Iranian languages (kaka/kakā/kake/etc.), and other Indo-European languages. Still ranging from childish to vulgar.

    A word that stops being used is not inherited. If that root was inherited by so many languages, it means that it kept being used, from ~five millenniums ago to now.

    Obligatory musical reference: this goliardic song. “Oh, how beautiful it is, to shit [cagar] in the mountain, where the grass tickles you in the hole of the butt”. It’s just keeping up with a 5000yo tradition.