PASS THE TORCH. From an Ancient Greek festival ritual of a torch race where a lit torch was passed from one runner to the next. Now an idiom for transferring one’s duties, knowledge, etc. to another. Found in English since late 1800s.

Called LAMPADEDROMIA (torch race). Rooted in LAMPAS (torch, light, flambeau), source of LAMP, and DROMOS (running, racecourse), seen in HIPPODROME or DROMEDARY.

In Aristophane's comedy The Frogs, a feckless runner rips a fart on a torch, extinguishing its flame. (You lose the lampadedromia if the flame goes out, it goes without saying.)

New level of proud in getting to represent my state of Ohio with some language insights on the hilarious—and culturally telling—Ohio meme. Ann-Marie Alcántara has the story for The Wall Street Journal.

So, here in Cincinnati, Ohio, we poke fun of Kentucky as our equivalent to "only in Ohio." We also more generally use Florida, which I suspect isn't unique to Ohio. What do you do regionally?

My latest post takes "coach," much in the news as a popular address for VP candidate Tim Walz, back to its small (Hungarian) town roots. mashedradish.com/2024/08/23/coa…

I also go deep on Coach Woodruff, who led the 1895 Penn Quakers football team to an undefeated season. With help from the The New York Times Archives.

The origin of the word #Paralympics reveals important lexical—and historical—insights into this sensational sporting event. My latest: mashedradish.com/2024/08/30/par…

Instances of #polio today are appalling—and that word is a clue to the history and origin of why polio is called "polio." My latest: mashedradish.com/2024/09/06/pol… #etymology

James Earl Jones. His very name evokes "voice." A remembrance in #etymology. mashedradish.com/2024/09/10/voi…

What starts with geoengineering jargon ends with Ancient Greek musical instruments. My latest: mashedradish.com/2024/09/14/fra…

Shogun. Tupperware. Secret Service. Interest rate. My latest rounds up some newsworthy words and names, and their origins take us from Japanese loanwords to Latin verbs 'counterfeiting' as English nouns. #Etymology as assorted as a Tupperware® set: mashedradish.com/2024/09/18/sho…

Fed announces big interest rate cut. Ever wonder why it's called "interest"? Oh, I got you covered—etymologically. mashedradish.com/2024/09/18/sho…

Current marketing strategies. Perfectly summed up, lol. (Vendor being set up for Cincinnati's Oktoberfest).

The giant-sized sensation of Moo Deng, the baby pygmy hippo in Thailand, has me asking: How did "pygmy" come to be a word for "small"? mashedradish.com/2024/09/26/pyg… #etymology #Moodeng

Longshoremen. The unionized dockworkers on strike across East and Gulf Coast ports have me wondering: What's so "long" about a "longshoreman"? Turns out, it unloaded a vowel along the way. Find out how and why in my latest post: mashedradish.com/2024/10/02/lon… #etymology

It's decorative gourd etymology season ... radish mashers: mashedradish.com/2024/10/18/gou…

"Spooky": a word with an elusive etymology but a decidely comic, and relatively younger and Dutch, first recorded use. Join me, won't you, in going to the etymological beyond of "spooky" mashedradish.com/2024/10/25/spo…

Etymologically, the word "onion" is the word "union," which is also a ... "pearl"? In my latest post, I chop up the origins of "onion": mashedradish.com/2024/10/30/oni…

America is an adverb. It can also be a preposition. mashedradish.com/2024/11/10/aga…