LatinSinisterDexterOn the left-hand sideOn the right hand side (dextrous) For a more complete list and lots of comments from visitors see theLeft handed language pageon the Anything Left Handed website. If you have any more words to add to this list or can help further with origins / me...
The Latin word was used in augury in the sense of "unlucky, unfavorable" (omens, especially bird flights, seen on the left hand were regarded as portending misfortune), and thussinisteracquired a sense of "harmful, unfavorable, adverse." This was from Greek influence, reflecting the early Gr...
The Latin word for left, sinister, also means unlucky, evil, and suspicious. The French word for left, gauche, also means clumsy. A left-handed compliment is an insult. It is believed that all polar bears are left-handed. A left-handed baseball pitcher is called a southpaw. (And no, ...
Latin: sinister Latvian: kreiss Lithuanian: kairioji Luxembourgish: lénks Lü: Macedonian: лев (lev) Malay: kiri (ms) Maltese: xellug m Maori: mauii Mi'kmaq: inaganeq Mongolian: зүүн (mn) (züün) Neapolitan: sinisto Norwegian: venstre (no) Ojibwe...
The left hand, like the Latin laevus, was esteemed of ill omen, hence the term sinister as equivalent to unfortunate. This was especially the case among the superstitious Greeks and Romans (see Potter's Gr. Ant. 1:323. Adams, Romans Ant. p. 301). Among the Hebrews the left likewise ...
remanent early 15c., "remaining, left over; left behind, remaining, continuing, staying," senses now obsolete, from Old French remanant..., remenant, present-participle of remanoir "to stay; be left," and directly from Latin remanentem (nominative remanens),...present participle of remanere...
“on the left hand or side.” Even back in Latin, though,sinisterhad already taken on morenefariousconnotations of “wrong, unfavorable,injurious,perverse.” (The idea here is connected to historical associations of the left-hand as weaker, and therefore less favorable, than the right. More ...
‘left’ is a reminder that historically the left-hand side of the body has been superstitiously regarded as of ill omen. To call it ‘friendly’ (a usage which survives in Swedishvänsterand Danishvenstre‘left’) was an attempt to placate the evil forces of the left. (Latinsinister‘...
4. Alleviation of distress; relief: Taking in the refugees was an act of mercy.Idiom: at the mercy of Without any protection against; helpless before: drifting in an open boat, at the mercy of the elements. [Middle English merci, from Old French, from Medieval Latin mercēs, mercēd-,...
The Latin word for left, sinister, also means unlucky, evil, and suspicious. The French word for left, gauche, also means clumsy. A left-handed compliment is an insult. It is believed that all polar bears are left-handed. A left-handed baseball pitcher is called a southpaw. (And no, ...