Host, hospitality, hospital, hospice, hostel, hotel, hostile, hostility, ostler, and guest. The words in the subtitle of this essay are all related in both form and meaning, though the relationships may not be immediately obvious. It may not be obvious that “hotel” and “guest” are related in form, or that “hospitality” and “hostility” are related … Continue reading A Host of Hosts

We often say that a particular language belongs to a family of languages. French, for instance, is a member of the Romance family of languages, along with Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, and some others. All the languages in the Romance family are derived from Latin. Latin itself belongs to a larger family, the Italic family, which … Continue reading All in the Family