This time in Language Day we concentrate in a very common item, in use all around the world - the pencil! The English word for it comes from Old French pincel, from Medieval Latin pincellus, and from Latin penicillus “painter’s brush, hair-pencil,” literally “little tail,” being diminutive of peniculus “brush,” itself a diminutive of penis “tail”.

In 1565 a large deposit of graphite was discovered in England. Extremely pure and solid, it could easily be sawn into sticks. That deposit remains in fact the only large-scale deposit of graphite ever found in this solid form. Anyway, in those days, chemistry was in its infancy, and the substance they found was thought to be a form of lead. So it was called plumbago (Latin for “lead ore”).

Well, today we know it wasn’t lead. Nevertheless, the word remained - to describe that black core of a pencil we are so familiar with. And the fact that the word stuck can be seen in many languages where pencil literally means lead pen. Let’s see what it is in some languages. In the list below, the word for lead is written in brackets.

And if you have 8 more minutes to spend, don’t forget to check the video below by DrawAwesome.com: How to Draw CLIFFS with Pencil Step by Step (Landscape Drawing)!

ARABIC - Qalam
CHINESE ?? 铅笔 Qiānbǐ
CROATIA ?? Olovka
CZECH ?? Tužka
DANISH ?? Blyant (bly = lead)
DUTCH ?? Potlood (lood = lead)
ENGLISH ????????????? Pencil
ESTONIAN ?? Pliiats**
FINNISH** ?? Lyijykynä (lyijy = lead)
FRENCH ?? Crayon
GERMAN ?? Bleistift (Blei = lead)
GREEK ?? μολύβι molývi
HAWAIIAN Penikala
HINDI ?? पेंसिल Pensil
HUNGARIAN ?? Ceruza**
ICELANDIC** ?? Blýantur (blý = lead)**
IRISH** ?? Peann luaidhe (luaidhe = lead)
ITALIAN ?? Matita
JAPANESE ?? 鉛筆 enpitsu
KOREAN ?? 연필 yeonpil
LATIN - Stilus plumbatus (plumbatus = lead)
LATVIAN ?? Zīmulis
LITHUANIAN ?? Pieštukas
NORWEGIAN ?? Blyant (bly = lead)
TAGALOG ??
POLISH ?? Ołówek
PORTUGUESE ?? Lápis
RUSSIAN ?? Каранда́ш
SAMOA ?? Penitala
SERBIA ?? Oловка - olovka
SPANISH ?? Lápiz
SWAHILI - Penseli
SWEDISH ?? Blyertspenna (bly = lead)
TURKISH ?? Kalem
UKRAINIAN ?? Oлівець - Olivets
WELSH ??????? Pensil

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQSfv55n0O0

Published in Tampa, FL 29.6.2022