Etymology — The origins of English words

From kilo- + hertz.

From Middle English iack napys, iac nape, iac napes (“derogatory nickname of the English military commander and statesman William de la Pole, 1st Duke of Suffolk (1396–1450)”), probably from Jacun or Jakin (“pet forms of the male name Jack”) + ape (“ape, monkey”) + -s (possibly modelled after surnames such as Hobbes and Jakkes), referring to Suffolk’s heraldic badge which was an ape’s chain and clog (“weight such as a block of wood or log attached to an animal to hinder motion”) (see the image, right). It is uncertain whether the word was first coined as a nickname for Suffolk (the earliest known uses), or to refer to an ape or an ape-like person. If the word was originally a nickname, some early uses of etymology 1 sense 2.1 (“person thought to behave like an ape or monkey”) may allude to Suffolk who was widely regarded as an upstart, having risen from the merchant class. In later uses, the middle element of the word was often treated as the indefinite article a or an, that is, as if the word meant “Jack, an ape”.

From jack (“jackfruit”), from Portuguese jaca (“jackfruit”), from Malayalam ചക്ക (cakka) / Tamil சக்கை (cakkai), + fruit.

Compare French jubilaire.

From Ancient Greek ἴσος (ísos, “equal”) + Ancient Greek χρόνος (khrónos, “time”) + -ous.

From in- + computable.

From Jacobin + -ic.

From in- + complexity.

Erroneous adaptation of junta, by assimilation with Spanish nouns in -o.

From Latin insolūbilitās or from insoluble + -ity.

From Ancient Greek κινητικός (kinētikós, “kinetic”).

From Jacobinic + -al or Jacobin + -ical.

From Latin intrōspectus, past participle of intrōspiciō. By surface analysis, intro- + -spect.

From Kabul + -i, or directly from Persian کابلی (“Kabuli”).

From juridic + -al or alternatively borrowed from Latin iuridicalis.

A blend of French (point d')interrogation (“question mark”) or the equivalent term in another Romance language + bang (“exclamation mark, exclamation point”), coined in a 1962 article in the journal TYPEtalks by American advertising executive Martin Kiehra Speckter (1915–1988), who invented the symbol.

The adjective is first attested circa 1390, in Middle English, the verb in 1570; inherited from Middle English infortunat(e), borrowed from Latin infortūnātus, see -ate (etymology 1, 2 and 3). Doublet of unfortunate.

Borrowed from Sanskrit कपिल (kapila).

Either: * from ir- (prefix meaning ‘not’) + respirable; or * borrowed from French irrespirable, from Late Latin irrespīrābilis, from Latin ir- (a variant of in- (prefix meaning ‘not’)) + respīrāre + -ābilis (suffix meaning ‘able to be’). Respīrāre is the present active infinitive of respīrō (“to blow or breathe back; to breathe, respire; to breathe out, exhale”), from re- (prefix meaning ‘again; back, backwards’) + spīrō (“to blow; to breathe, respire; to breathe out, exhale”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *(s)peys- (“to blow; to breathe”)).

A spelling variant of Carly.

From Middle French inviolable, from Latin inviolābilis (“untouchable”), from violō (“violate”). Equivalent to in- + violable. Piecewise doublet of unviolable.

From Middle French imputation, from Latin imputatio.

Possibly an African word akin to Bantu tshikabo (“they bow the head docilely”). Alternatively, perhaps from jig, formed similarly to bug and bugaboo.

From Japon + -ian.