Post #1396071

2026-04-17 17:42 UTC

The Old English word for a flower was ‘blōsma’. While this word survived, becoming modern ‘blossom’, it gave up part of its meaning to a French loanword. Interestingly though, this loanword, spelled both ‘flour’ and ‘flower’ in Middle English, stems from the same root as ‘blossom’. Moreover, it wasn’t until the 19th century that the spelling variants ‘flour’ and ‘flower’ were differentiated. Each was assigned one of the meanings: “finest part of ground grain” versus “blossom of a plant”.

Replies (8)

@tbzhg@mastodon.scot 2026-04-17 19:40

@yvanspijk Nice chart as always ! I was wondering if it cognates with "bleuñv" in Breton (and "blodyn" in Welsh), as the correspondence "ñv/m" exists

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@niallor@mastodon.ie 2026-04-17 20:46

@yvanspijk thanks! This explains "tarwebloem" and the like to me.

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@Blimundus@mastodon.social 2026-04-18 06:05

@yvanspijk lang geleden dat ik nog aan “ego flos” gedacht had (Gezelle)…

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@notsoloud@expressional.social 2026-04-18 06:47

@yvanspijk Extrreeeemely small nitpick: Blomme for flower is archaic in Danish, the usual word is blomst. Blomme means plum or egg yolk, which of course may share the same etymology.

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@joncounts@mastodon.nz 2026-04-18 07:02

@yvanspijk Fascinating. I love how we got "flower" and "bloom" in English via two routes from the same proto-Indo-European root. That's neat.

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@cbuddenhagen@mastodon.nz 2026-04-18 07:10

@yvanspijk #bloomscroll

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@selenacht@mamot.fr 2026-04-18 19:12

@yvanspijk And suddenly, "Blume" (gerlan) doesn't seem all that different from "flower".

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@bosak@flx.masto.host 2026-04-19 01:39

@yvanspijk The now unusual meaning of "to blow" as "to bloom" in English makes it easy for a modern reader to misconstrue the first lines of this once famous WW1 poem: In Flanders fields the poppies blow Between the crosses, row on row

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