I had a wonderful day trip to Le Havre, France with a photography sesh that inspired this week’s word: reflection, as in that beautiful thing we see in the mirror every day. It comes from our favorite language ancestor, Latin:

Flectere: “to bend” (think of the English word, flexible)
Prefix of re: “back” (think return, remember, reverse)
Reflectere: “to bend back”

And so we get the word which means to have something bend back: “the throwing back by a body or surface of light, heat, or sound.”

Plus, science has always been far and away my weakest subject, but I seem to remember there being something about bending light when it comes to sight? I feel like the understanding of bending light came after Latin was no longer an active language, but cool parallel!

Science nerds are welcome to help a girl out in the comments!

Notice that the roots also make sense for reflection in terms of “thinking back on something”.

“Pardon me, I just need a moment to bend back that thought for a while.”

Happy Hump Day, my fellow nerds! Keep an eye out for more language history next week and feel free to request words you’d like to learn about either in the comments below or on Insta.

References

The Google Machine
https://www.google.com/search?q=reflection+definition&rlz=1C1CHBF_enUS850US850&oq=refl&aqs=chrome.0.69i59j0l2j69i60j69i57j69i65.2123j0j9&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

Online Etymology Dictionary
https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=reflection