Words in the English Language That Originate From Terms Describing Weather Conditions

In an atmospheric episode of their incredibly informative whiteboard series for Mental Floss , linguist Arika Okrent and illustrator Sean O’Neill verbally and visually offer examples of common words in the English language that originate from terms describing certain weather conditions, such as detonate.

The root of detonate is the Latin tonare, or thunder. De-tonare is a thundering down. By detonating something you can create your own thunder. Astonish also goes back to tonare. To be astonished is literally to be thunderstruck. Pretty astonishing, huh?

Lori Dorn
Lori Dorn

Lori is a Laughing Squid Contributing Editor based in New York City who has been writing blog posts for over a decade. She also enjoys making jewelry, playing guitar, taking photos and mixing craft cocktails.

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