Since the world is in an unprecedented state of quarantine, I thought this might be a good word to explore.

Those with knowledge of romance languages may put together the similarities between quarantine and the word for forty in several latin-based languages:

Spanish: cuarenta
French: quarante
Portuguese: quarenta
Italian: quaranta

Yes, there’s a reason for this similarity.

In the mid-1300s, the bubonic plague hit the world in a similar manner as the coronavirus: globally and with a large portion of devastation in Europe and Asia. One of the top ways that it was spread was also similar to today: travel. Though, back then, travel was by boat.

Starting in 1377, the port city of Venice adopted a new policy: to ensure that no incoming passengers were carrying the plague, ships arriving from places known to be plague-stricken had to wait off the port for 40 days before finally disembarking in Venice.

So the the name for the ships’ period of isolation (quarantine) came from the number of days during which they were isolated (40 in Italian: quaranta).

The Proto-Indo-European (PIE) root for four: kwetwer
Latin word for forty: quadraginta
Italian word for forty: quaranta
Old Italian word for “period of 40 days”, which is now also the current Italian word for quarantine: quarantena

Bonus nerd knowledge:

In the 15th century, quarentyne was also known as the desert in which Jesus fasted for 40 days and nights. You know, the thing that happened that makes lent 40 days long. Wait, Easter was last Sunday… did we all just accidentally give up human interaction for lent?

In the 1520s, quarantine meant the 40 days during which a widow was allowed to stay in her late husband’s house.

It wasn’t until the 17th century that quarantine came to mean in English what it meant in Italian: the period of time during which a ship is isolated when there’s a possibility it could be carrying disease.

From there, quarantine slowly evolved to mean “a strict isolation imposed to prevent the spread of disease”, regardless of the duration of time.

It looks like we will all be quarantined in one way or another for more than 40 days, and some of you maybe have been already. Regardless of how long this period of isolation ends up being, thank you to everyone for self-quarantining and, in so doing, being part of the global effort to save as many lives as we can.

Happy WordNerd Wednesday! Feel free to leave comments below with words you’d like to see explained on hump days to follow or DM me with ideas on Instagram.

References

Online Etymology Dictionary: Quarantine
https://www.etymonline.com/word/quarantine

History.com: Black Death
https://www.history.com/topics/middle-ages/black-death

Detroit Catholic
https://detroitcatholic.com/news/gary-michuta/why-did-jesus-fast-for-40-days-in-the-desert

Dictionary.com: Quarantine
https://www.dictionary.com/browse/quarantine