Etymology
The word insect dates back to 1600, from the Latin word insectum, meaning "with a notched or divided body", or literally "cut into", from neuter plural of insectare, "to cut into, to cut up," from in- "into" + secare "to cut"; because insects are "cut into" three sections. The word created by Pliny the Elder's loan-translation of the Greek word ἔντομος (éntomon) or "insect" (as in entomology), which was Aristotle's term for this class of life, also in reference to their "notched" bodies, first documented in English in 1601 in Holland's translation of Pliny. Translations of Aristotle's term also form the usual word for "insect" in Welsh (trychfil, from trychu "cut" and mil, "animal"), Serbo-Croatian (zareznik, from rezati, "cut"), Russian (насекомое nasekomoe, from sekat, "cut"), etc.
Read more about this topic: Insect
Famous quotes containing the word etymology:
“The universal principle of etymology in all languages: words are carried over from bodies and from the properties of bodies to express the things of the mind and spirit. The order of ideas must follow the order of things.”
—Giambattista Vico (1688–1744)
“Semantically, taste is rich and confusing, its etymology as odd and interesting as that of “style.” But while style—deriving from the stylus or pointed rod which Roman scribes used to make marks on wax tablets—suggests activity, taste is more passive.... Etymologically, the word we use derives from the Old French, meaning touch or feel, a sense that is preserved in the current Italian word for a keyboard, tastiera.”
—Stephen Bayley, British historian, art critic. “Taste: The Story of an Idea,” Taste: The Secret Meaning of Things, Random House (1991)