Triceps

Let’s hear it for Birmingham joining our audience this week! The second biggest city in England, nicknamed ‘the city of a thousand trades’ because during the Industrial revolution it was the fuel of the country, from jewellery to heavy machinery. And today, there’s a show with that name by the Birmingham Royal Ballet paying homage to the city. Welcome Birmingham! Thank you for listening.

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(Piano music) Hello, and welcome to Your Greek Word On A Sunday, a weekly, bite-size podcast for anyone curious on language, etymology and connections. I am your host, Emmanuela Lia and wherever you are in the world, if you want to entertain your brain for a few minutes, this is the podcast for you. Let's Go!

In ancient Greece among the classes of mythical creatures were, the monsters! Today I’ll tell you about Cerberus, the guardian of the underworld. A monster that claims as many forms as every writer who decided to describe it. They all agree it was a dog that made sure nobody gets in and out of Hades without permission but whether it had 50, 100 or just 3 heads , a dragon tail, a mix of dog and snake heads with poison, three backs or three bodies, depends on who you read. The description that survived was the three headed one and it matched the description of all his monster siblings that were multi headed. He became very famous when Hercules managed to subdue him. There’s an adjective that was attached to Cerberus and sometimes you only had to say that to imply him. Τρια (tria) in both ancient and modern Greek means ‘three’ and κεφαλή (kefali) means ‘head’. The masculine combined word came to English in 1577 in John Grange’s fiction novel ‘The Golden Aphrodite’. In Latin the word used in anatomy to describe the upper muscle of your arm that looks as if it has three tops, three heads, is a direct transfer from Greek, minus the alphabet adjustment. And since the beginning of the 20th century we use the shortened and singular version ΤΡΙΚΕΦΑΛΟΣ/TRICEP

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Welcome Cordoba! I’m so glad you joined our audience. This is the city where Christopher Columbus first met with Queen Isabella and secured a stipend to continue his studies and prepare for his expedition . One of the Queen’s demands was that he wouldn’t go to any other monarchs for funding. And the rest is history. Thank you for listening Cordoba!

(Piano music) Hello, and welcome to Your Greek Word On A Sunday, a weekly, bite-size podcast for anyone curious on language, etymology and connections. I am your host, Emmanuela Lia and wherever you are in the world, if you want to entertain your brain for a few minutes, this is the podcast for you. Let's Go!

Τρέπειν (trepin) is an Ancient Greek infinitive meaning ‘to turn’ in modern Greek the noun is τροπή (tropi). Around 490BC a practice started appearing in Ancient Greece that would become a custom and travel all the way to today albeit a little modified. After every battle they’d win , ancient Greeks would find the exact spot where they believed the enemy started turning away and they would either place a stick with an enemy armour on it (like a scarecrow) or they would build a small monument as a reminder of their victory and a threat so the enemy won’t attempt to come back. The custom was adopted by the Romans but it started disappearing around 600BC. The word came to English through Latin and French in the 1500s and shortly after started it’s figurative shift. By the revival on the Olympic Games in Athens in 1896 the word was well established as a reward for the winner of a sport. ΤΡΟΠΑΙΟ/TROPHY

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Happy May everyone! Give a big welcome to Mexico City! The birthplace of colour television. Oh yes! In the 1940s, 23 year old Guillermo Gonzales Camarena invented the 'chromoscopic adaptor for television equipment'. The base for what would become colour television 10 years later. Thank you for listening Mexico City!

(Piano music) Hello, and welcome to Your Greek Word On A Sunday, a weekly, bite-size podcast for anyone curious on language, etymology and connections. I am your host, Emmanuela Lia and wherever you are in the world, if you want to entertain your brain for a few minutes, this is the podcast for you. Let's Go!

This month it’ll be talking about words that sound like they come from the same root but actually don’t. In the mid 19th century the young french aerialist and acrobat Jules Leotard was practicing over his father’s pool using his modified equipment . A rod held horizontally by two ropes on either side. That was something he saw used closer to the ground but never so high and never in full swing! He first performed on it in 1859 at the Cirque Napoleon in Paris and brought his act to London in 1861 flying above audiences eating their dinner. The shape the equipment forms with the ceiling, is an Ancient Greek geometric shape that is named after the very much still in use Greek word for ‘table’ ΤΡΑΠΕΖΙ/TRAPEZE

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