The Journey of Words

Every language is made up of words from different places, events, and periods of time.

A definition tells us what a word means and how it is used in our own time. An etymology tells us where a word came from and what it used to mean.

Each of those words has an exciting story to tell us about where, when, how and why they came about.

Written by Andrea Marcolongo, a classics expert and linguist, whose books have become bestsellers and have been translated into several languages

Illustrated by Andrea Ucini, who regularly works for The New York Times, the Economist, the Washington Post, and many other top magazines and journals.

Understanding how words have developed can teach us a great deal about our cultural history. Studying the histories of familiar words can help us deduce the meanings of unfamiliar words, thereby enriching our vocabulary.