Etymology — The Origins of English Words

onboarding

English

A compound of the phrase 'on board', as in bringing someone on board, with the -ing ending; it spread through business and human-resources usage.

omnivore

Latin

From Latin omnis 'all' and vorare 'to devour', so literally 'all-eating'.

OML

English

An initialism of the phrases 'oh my Lord', 'oh my life' or 'on my life', which reading is intended depends on context.

ombudsman

Swedish

From Swedish ombudsman, literally 'representative' or 'agent', from ombud 'commission, proxy'. The office originated in Scandinavian government and the word entered English in the twentieth century.

oligarchy

Greek

From Greek oligarkhia, from oligoi "few" and arkhein "to rule": rule by the few.

oligarch

Greek

From Greek oligarkhes, from oligoi "few" and arkhein "to rule".

Ohm's law

German

Named after Georg Simon Ohm, the German physicist who established the relationship; the unit of resistance, the ohm, is named after him as well.

ohana

Hawaiian

Hawaiian ʻohana, from ʻohā, the shoot that grows from the taro root — a family understood as growth from a common stock.

obfuscate

Latin

From Latin obfuscare "to darken", from ob- "over" and fuscus "dark, dusky".

OBE

English

An initialism, chiefly of Officer of the Order of the British Empire, an order founded in 1917.

nvm

English

An initialism of "never mind".

nuclear family

Latin

From nuclear in its original sense of "forming a nucleus or core", from Latin nucleus "kernel" — the core unit of kin. It has nothing to do with nuclear energy, which draws on the same root by way of the atomic nucleus.

np

English

An initialism of "no problem"; separately, of "now playing" and, in complexity theory, of "nondeterministic polynomial time".

notarized

Latin

From notary, via Latin notarius "clerk, shorthand writer", from nota "a mark or note", plus the verb-forming ending -ize.

non sequitur

Latin

Latin for "it does not follow", from non "not" and sequitur "it follows", from sequi "to follow".

non-fiction

English

Formed from the prefix non-, meaning "not", plus fiction, from Latin fingere "to shape or invent".

nomenclature

Latin

From Latin nomenclatura "a calling by name", from nomen "name" and calare "to call". A Roman nomenclator was the slave who whispered the names of approaching citizens to his master.

NOC

English

An initialism whose expansion depends on field: network operations centre, National Olympic Committee, non-official cover, or no objection certificate.

no cap

English

From African American Vernacular English, where cap means a lie or an exaggeration and to cap is to lie; no cap is therefore "no lie".

nm

English

An initialism, standing in different contexts for "not much", "never mind", nanometre or nautical mile.

nitty-gritty

Origin

Of uncertain origin; said to have been first used by black jazz musicians from the United States, the word is perhaps a reduplication of gritty (“resembling grit”) (ultimately from Proto-Germanic *greutą (“grit”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʰrewd-) with alteration of the first syllable. An urban legend links the origin of the word to the debris remaining in the holds of slave ships after the slaves had been disembarked, but there is no evidence for this. The word is not attested early enough to have been associated with slavery.

nieve

Latin

Spanish nieve descends from Latin nix, accusative nivem, "snow", the same root behind English niveous and Spanish nevada.

ngl

English

An initialism of "not gonna lie".

Netflix and chill

English

A literal pairing of the streaming service Netflix with chill in its slang sense of "relax", which spread online in the mid-2010s as an innuendo.