Comments on: The Etymology of Food, Part I: Why Nothing Rhymes With Orange

By: Paul Nielsen

Paul Nielsen — Fri, 18 May 2012 20:06:16 +0000

Love this! Orange in Scandinavia is called Aebelsin which is literally Apple from China but reading now that apple referred to generally any fruit, it gives the term new flavour (pun intended).

By: Timothy

Timothy — Mon, 16 Apr 2012 16:24:44 +0000

The above is my best GUESS.

By: Timothy

Timothy — Mon, 16 Apr 2012 16:23:25 +0000

My GUESS about the origin is that of the many agriculturally associated words that passed from Arabic to medieval Spanish, “naranja” was pronounced, in Spanish, a lot like “naransh” the last consonant being, eventually, an unvoiced sibilant. Spanish, for exact reasons unknown to this writer, went thru a sound change during the course of the Golden Age, whereby the “sh” sound became a velarized fricative, (hard “h”) for which Spanish is quite famous in my elementary Spanish classes. When the word “naranj” entered French, the French must have maintained the last consonant, (it’s pronounced more like the English version today, with different tonal accent) – hence we got the French pronunciation. The French say “orange”, we say “orange” : ), the last consonants being very similar. Alas, because of the curious origin of the word, English just doesn’t have words that follow the same peculiar phonetic sequence as “orange”. We have all those sounds in other words, but not in the same, precise order, not in the same exact phonological context. A counter example would be door vs floor, or stated vs inflated. So rhyming has to do with a history of repeated STRUCTURES, with few random cases that would produce a rhyme with words like “orange”.

By: a student

a student — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 20:34:48 +0000

Thanks! You helped me a ton on my research project!

By: Iris Miller

Iris Miller — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 11:39:50 +0000

Well, how about ORANGE rhymes with FRINGE ?!
“I hid behind the curtains eating my orange,
when the juice spurted out and wet the fringe…
boy, am I in trouble!”
And SILVER rhymes with SLIVER!
My granny gave me polish to shine up her silver,
I rubbed so hard I got a sliver.
ouch!”

Sounds rhymed to me!

By: ash

ash — Thu, 14 May 2009 01:09:09 +0000

door hinge isn’t one word….therefore there is no one word that rhymes with orange (flange doesn’t according to rhyming dictionary, but ppl pronounce things differently) and silver, purple, and month (all mentioned above) do not have rhymes either. interesting

By: Steve

Steve — Wed, 13 May 2009 22:16:46 +0000

For all those that say they missed the origin…THINK, people! The reason why no other word rhymes with orange (the premise of the whole article) is that no other word passed from Sanskrit to Persian to Spanish in the 14th Century the way the word ORANGE did. It was right there in the text, how could so many of you miss the whole drift of the story?

By: The Etymology of Food, Part II: Meaty Stories | Food & Think

The Etymology of Food, Part II: Meaty Stories | Food & Think — Tue, 12 May 2009 15:44:40 +0000

[...] week I wrote about the origins of words for fruits in English (and judging from the comments, irked a few [...]

By: Lisa Bramen

Lisa Bramen — Mon, 11 May 2009 21:42:05 +0000

Marc,

That is interesting about the Arabic word “banan.” I checked a few dictionaries and all list the Wolof origin for our word “banana,” but I wonder if the West Africans picked up the Arabic word for finger to describe the fruit. In looking at the page you cite from Koeppel’s book on Amazon.com, I notice he also mentions that one variety of banana may have been brought to North Africa as a byproduct of a slave trade with Arab nations. Perhaps the word made its way to West Africa from there?

Thanks for the comment.

By: Marc

Marc — Sun, 10 May 2009 20:52:53 +0000

Dan Koeppel’s “Banana: The Fate of the Fruit that Changed the World” says that the word banana derives from the Arabic “banan,” which translates as “finger” (p. 44 of the paperback edition). I don’t think he mentions Wolof or West African languages in his book. Could there be competing theories about the word’s origin?

By: Sean

Sean — Sun, 10 May 2009 19:25:58 +0000

So thats where oranges came from. Wait a minute isnt this article supposed to be about why no word rhymes with orange. I must have missed that part.

By: Ben

Ben — Sun, 10 May 2009 18:17:24 +0000

Door-hinge ryms with orange

By: Mary

Mary — Sun, 10 May 2009 18:05:18 +0000

GREAT POST!!!! Very interesting!

By: Walter H. Edwards

Walter H. Edwards — Sun, 10 May 2009 17:55:16 +0000

Also there is month and purple that does not rhyme with another word in English that I know of.

By: Barry

Barry — Sun, 10 May 2009 17:51:52 +0000

How about cringe?