Not only are vegetables good for you, they can be a source of delight: the fragrance and sweetness of tomatoes on a summer day, the delicious pop that gives snap peas their name, the contented murmuring a winter stew on the stove.
The words we use for vegetables are loaded with the history of how people have eaten throughout the centuries. Here are some of the etymologies of your favorite (or least favorite) greens.
Radish
The word ‘radish’ is a special word for word-lovers, because it simply means ‘root’! The root is the same one we see in ‘radical’.
Carrot
From ancient Greek καρωτόν (karoton), through Latin and French.
The Old English word for a carrot was more, which is cognate with the modern Welsh moron (no, those Welsh greengrocers aren’t insulting your intelligence!)
The Old English word is distantly related to the Russian word for carrot, морковь (morkov’).
Potato
This New World vegetable comes from the Taíno language, which was spoken in the majority of the Caribbean before the Spanish Conquest. The Taíno word was batata, which was adopted as the Spanish patata and eventually became the English potato.
The German word is Kartoffel is a corruption of the Italian tartufolo, which came for the word for truffle. This in turn came from the Latin terrae tuber, tuber of the earth.
Tomato
Borrowed from Spanish, from the Nahuatl-language word tomatl. Nahuatl was the language spoken in the Aztec empire, centered on modern-day Mexico.
Avocado
The Nahuatl word ahuacatl gave us the common Spanish word aguacate and the slightly altered form avocado which was borrowed into English.
In many parts of South America, this vegetable is called a palta, from a Quechua word.
Corn
This word simply meant, and is indeed cognate with the English word ‘grain’. Maize (borrowed from Taíno) was originally known as Indian corn.
Onion
In colloquial Latin, a string of onions (formally known as cepa) was known as an unio, a union (individual vegetables united on a single string). This was borrowed into Old French and English.
The more formal Latin word cepa became the root of Italian cipolla, Spanish cebolla, and German Zwiebel. It also is the root of the English word chive.
The Russian word is лук (luk) which is related to the English word leek through Proto-Germanic.
Shallot and scallion derive from the Latin ascalonia cepa — onion of Ashkelon.
Garlic
Garlic is a native English word composed of two elements: gar meaning spear or clove, and leek (see above).
The Romance language terms aglio (Italian), ajo (Spanish), ail (French) derives from the Latin alium, which may be related to the word for wings, referring to the cloves.
The German Knoblauch comes from the verb klieben (to cleave) and Lauch (leek); therefore, a cloven leek.
Mushroom
From Old French moisseron, probably derived from the word mosse (moss).
Zucchini
An Italian diminutive of zucca, meaning ‘squash’ — a little squash. Ultimately from the Latin cucurbita, meaning ‘gourd’.
Outside of US usage this vegetable is typically known as a courgette, a French diminutive of courge (derived from Latin cucurbita, which also gave us gourd) meaning a marrow squash.
Pumpkin
English speakers added the diminutive suffix -kin to the French pompon (melon) to refer to this squash. Ultimately derives from the Greek word πέπων (pepon, also melon) which in turn comes from the word for ‘to ripen’.
Squash
Unrelated to what you might do to a bug, as it is borrowed from the Narragansett language spoken by the Algonquin tribe in what is now Rhode Island. Their word was askutasquash, meaning ‘something that can be eaten raw’.
Eggplant
This disgusting vegetable has been given a disgusting name so that you can consider yourself fairly warned.
In the UK, it is known as an aubergine, which reached French through the Arabic اَلْبَاذِنْجَان (al-badinjan). Ultimately from Sanskrit वातिगगम (vatigagama).
Lettuce
If you break open a lettuce stalk, you will find a milk-like liquid. This led to the Latin term lactuca, derived from the word for milk.
Cabbage
If you were speaking Old French, you would find the phrase ‘a head of cabbage’ reduntant, because caboche simply meant ‘head’ in the northern dialect, ultimately derived from the Latin caput.
In modern French, the word is chou, derived from the Latin caulis, meaning a stalk or the stem of a cabbage.
Cauliflower
From Latin caulis (see above) and English flower, together essentially meaning ‘cabbage-flower’.
Broccoli
In Latin, broccus meant buck-toothed, perhaps from a Gaulish word for badger. In Italian, brocco meant something that projected (like a buck tooth), and broccoli was a diminutive version of this word.
Asparagus
From Latin asparagus, from Greek ἀσφάραγος, which also meant ‘throat’.
It was known as sparrowgrass in English until the Victorian period through folk etymology.
In Old English, the word was eorþnafola, meaning earth-navel.
Artichoke
The Latin word for the artichoke was carduus, which also referred to the thistle (giving us the English word card as in ‘to card wool’, often done with thistles, and chard). The modern version of the plant, however, was introduced to Spain by the Moors as ‘الْخُرْشُوف’ (al-kursuf)’ where it spread across Europe. The word used in the northern Italian Lombard language was articiocco, which gave rise to the English word. They were introduced to England in the early 16th century.
Beet
From Latin beta, origin unknown.
The Russian word is свёкла (svyokla) which comes from the Greek word σεῦτλον meaning chard (see above).
Spinach
The Persian word اسپناخ (espanax) was borrowed into Arabic as إِسْفَانَاخ (isfanak), in turn borrowed by the French as espinoche, and finally found its way to us.
Celery
From ancient Greek σέλῑνον (selinon), simply meaning celery, borrowed through the French.
Native English words for this vegetable were march and smallage.
Cucumber
Ultimately from Latin cucumis (cucumber). This in turn comes from a much older root which has spread widely, but unfortunately cannot be traced to a specific source.
Pea
The Ancient Greeks knew the pea as πισον (pison), it became pisum in Latin and pise in Old English. Originally, pease was the singular form of the Modern English word, while peasen was the plural. However, the final ‘s’ sound led English speakers to believe that pease was the plural and drop the ‘s’ of the root to leave us with the new singular word ‘pea’. (A similar thing happened with the word ‘cherise’ meaning ‘cherry’).
Pepper
This may be the oldest traceable word on the list — ancient Greek had πέπερι (peperi). We don’t know where they inherited the pepper from directly, but Sanskrit has the very similar word पिप्पलि (pippali) to mean a pepper.