Ah, springtime! It’s very vert.
Yea, verily!
And since it’s Wednesday and words are our favourite Wednesday jam, let’s enjoy a wallow in the etymology of ver, which is Latin for spring, or the springtime. From it we get the word vernal – pertaining to spring – which doesn’t get much of an outing these days other than in reference to the equinox.
Ver – it’s very straightforward…
But not so fast!
That verdant verdure – or fresh green pasture – which is synonymous with this time of year derives not from ver, but from vert. This Old French word for green comes from the Latin viridis – green, blooming – which derived from virere – to be green.
Viridis also gives us viridian, the name for the colour between green and teal on a colour wheel. The process of making chromium green oxide was discovered in Paris in 1838 by Pannetier, who kept his methods secret. In 1859 another Parisian chemist, Guignet, synthesised a hydrated form of chromium oxide which created the viridian pigment.
Vert also gives us verdigris – that lovely green patina that forms on copper when it is exposed to the air. Verdigris comes from verte de Grece in Old French, which literally means ‘green of Greece’.
So ver beginnings in words are easy because they’re all about spring and green?
No. As Kermit told us, it isn’t easy being green.
Without doubt you could have a verdant verge – in the sense of a lushly green border of, for example, grass by the side of the road. But verge does not share etymological roots with verdant. It comes originally from the Latin virga, meaning a shoot or rod. Leaving aside its 13th century English application to the male member, verge still has a really interesting history.
It was used in English, to quote the Online Etymology Dictionary, in the phrase “within the verge (c. 1500, also as Anglo-French dedeinz la verge), i.e. “subject to the Lord High Steward’s authority” (as symbolized by the rod of office), originally a 12-mile radius round the king’s court.” But the meaning of the word back-flipped, for reasons that are unclear, and changed to “the outermost edge of an expanse or area”.
In other words, verge went from being inside the area of authority to right at the edge of it, if not actually beyond the pale. (The ‘pale’, of course, being the wooden stakes which marked the outer boundary of a jurisdiction, as in the area around Dublin where English law was enforced in Ireland between the late 12th and 16th centuries.)
And what about our truthful ver words, like verify, verisimilitude, and verily? They’ve got nothing to do with spring, being green, or a rod, right?
Right. They have yet another Latin source – veritatem, which means truth. The maxim In vino veritas – in wine there is truth – is a concept that’s been around for as long as there’s been wine. I could say it’s very true… but I’d just be repeating myself. The word ‘very’ is simply asserting the truth or genuineness of a thing – so it’s the same as saying something is truly true. Unnecessary and bound to make people think you are protesting too much.
Vera and Verity are virtue names meaning truth, but since people don’t chat in Latin so much anymore, they’re kind of stealth virtue names, like Amity, Benedict and Fidal, rather than the slap-you-in-the-face virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity (which are still an improvement on the beat-you-over-the-head-with-a-stick Puritan grace names like Abstinence, Humility and Resolve or the hortatory masterpiece of If-Jesus-Christ-Had-Not-Died-for-Thee-Thou-Hadst-Been-Damned Barebones).
But, as usual, I digress…
Chasing down all the versions of ver (that’s another one from the Latin vertere, to turn) would take more time that I have for this post because spring has sprung and I have gardening to do. All the photos in the post are from my garden – which makes me happy, but kind of overwhelmed. I grew up in the sub-tropics and having a spring garden is kind of weird.
So, any tips on what garden tasks I should be doing would be very welcome.