I am looking for the origin of the word and why it is called summer.
2006-09-10 04:16:48 · 10 answers · asked by Adam B 1 in Society & Culture ➔ Languages
It's called summer because if it were called fred, then everyone would be really confused!
2006-09-10 04:23:14 · answer #1 · answered by JetDoc 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
slander_q_libel has the first correct etymology, but to answer your question of "why" it is the same reason that a table is called 'table'. It is an arbitrary set of sounds that were assigned to the meaning far back in the recesses of time for reasons that can no longer be reconstructed. Perhaps there were reasons along the lines of the names of some months in Native American languages--"Moon of Green Grass", etc.--or the Latin names we use for months--"March" from "Marcius" from "Mars", the god of war; "November" from "ninth month", etc. But the two season names "winter" and "summer" are so ancient that we cannot see the reason any more.
2006-09-10 05:07:17 · answer #2 · answered by Taivo 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Summer is a general Germanic word, with relatives in German and Danish sommer, Dutch zomer, and Swedish sommar. It goes back ultimately to an Indo-European base *sem-, which also produced Welsh haf 'summer' and Sanskrit sama 'year, season.'
2006-09-10 04:26:15 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
summer (1)
"hot season of the year," O.E. sumor, from P.Gmc. *sumur- (cf. O.S., O.N., O.H.G. sumar, O.Fris. sumur, M.Du. somer, Du. zomer, Ger. Sommer), from PIE base *sem- (cf. Skt. sama "season, half-year," Avestan hama "in summer," Armenian amarn "summer," O.Ir. sam, O.Welsh ham, Welsh haf "summer"). O.N. sumarsdag, first day of summer, was the Thursday that fell between April 9 and 15.
2006-09-10 04:26:01 · answer #4 · answered by slander 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Because in English only a few words have the meaning of what they really mean.
Summer in Greek is καλοκαίρι -->kalokairi=kalos(good)+ kairos(weather)
2006-09-10 08:48:28 · answer #5 · answered by kostas p 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
summer is a season and every season has a name
2006-09-10 04:18:16 · answer #6 · answered by Shiny 3 · 0⤊ 1⤋
hard problem. search with the search engines. just that can help!
2014-12-07 15:23:05 · answer #7 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
you have to look in a dictionary
2006-09-10 05:30:06 · answer #8 · answered by AngelOfRock 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
because autumn was already taken
2006-09-10 04:30:34 · answer #9 · answered by lilquietviv 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋
did you look it up in the dictionary?
2006-09-10 04:18:58 · answer #10 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 1⤋