1/9 🧵 The Hebrew word for piano is psanter (פסנתר). It traces back to the Bible – but there, it wasn't a piano at all. It was a harp. So how did a harp become a piano? This is the wild story of a 2,000-year linguistic journey... 🎹 2/9 Early Hebrew speakers had a problem: how do you say "piano" in Hebrew?
Some just borrowed piano from Italian. Others tried recycling biblical terms like ugav or nevel.
None of those caught on. 🤷‍♂️

🧵 THREAD: The Hebrew word for chrysanthemum is chartzit. And hidden inside is one of the most beautiful linguistic journeys in history. 🌼 1/7 The ancient Greeks called this flower chrysanthemon — from chrysos (gold) and anthemon (flower). The golden flower. 2/7

🧵 THREAD: Buy flowers in Israel today, and you'll get a zer - a bouquet. But for most of Hebrew history, zer had nothing to do with flowers. 🌸 1/13 In the Torah, zer is the golden rim around sacred objects: "You shall make a golden zer around it." 2/13

🧵 THREAD: Superman’s biggest secret isn’t his identity. It’s that he’s Jewish. 🦸‍♂️ 1/12 Everyone knows Superman has a secret identity. But here’s the one nobody talks about: Superman is Jewish. 2/12

1/8 🧵 Great question! What was the real pronunciation in the biblical "shibboleth" test? TD;LR It probably wasn't about "SH" vs "S" at all.

https://twitter.com/raphael_da19664/status/1950572867235528994

2/8 The traditional story: Ephraimites couldn't say "shibboleth" and said "sibboleth" instead. But linguistically, this makes no sense. No Semitic language shows SH merging with S, and S-speakers usually don't struggle with SH.

1/15 🧵 This Hebrew letter ש represents two sounds today: "sh" and "s." But here's a 2,000-year-old mystery that just got solved: it used to represent THREE completely different sounds. 2/15 Today we distinguish them with dots - right side for "sh," left side for "s." But why would ancient scribes create one letter for three sounds? The answer reveals secrets about how Hebrew really sounded 3,000 years ago.

🧵 THREAD: Atzabani might be Hebrew's most overloaded word. Not because it's misused — but because Hebrew speakers use it for literally every negative emotion imaginable. Here's why that's a problem. 1/8 2/ When someone says a person is atzabani, what do they mean? Nervous? Angry? Jumpy? Irritable? Tense? Bitter? Furious? The answer is: yes, all of those. One word trying to cover seven different emotional states.

🧵 THREAD: Hebrew didn't borrow the English suffix "-able." It accidentally invented its own version — and the story shows how languages can solve the same problem in completely different ways. 1/9 2/ English has "readable," "drinkable," "breakable." Hebrew now has qari, shati, shavir. Same function, totally different system. But Hebrew had to build this from scratch.

🧵 THREAD: The Hebrew word for duck — barvaz — only appeared in 1908. But its origin story spans 5,000 years and shows how words can travel through civilizations to land in the most unexpected places. 1/7 2/ It started with the Sumerians, who invented writing and called geese uz. This word began an epic journey: the Akkadians adopted it, then Aramaic speakers turned it into awaz (adding an alef for easier pronunciation).

🧵 THREAD: The Hebrew word for "one"—ekhad—seems ancient and unshakable. But here's the twist: it's a linguistic imposter that overthrew the original word across almost every Semitic language.
A story of ancient revolution hiding in plain sight. 1/10 2/ Thousands of years ago, ALL Semitic languages used the same word for "one": 'isht. You can still see its fossils: Akkadian ishten, Ugaritic 'isht, Ancient South Arabian 'isht. A perfect linguistic family tree.

🧵 THREAD: Think English spelling is chaos? Hebrew says "hold my beer" with 22 letters, zero vowels, and pure linguistic anarchy.
Let me introduce you to the most unhinged writing system ever created... 1/12 2/ Meet Alef (א): the ultimate shapeshifter. In ani (אני), it's "a." In eretz (ארץ), "e." In eem (אם), "ee." In rosh, somehow "o." And in or (אור)? Dead silent. One letter, five personalities, zero consistency.

1/12 🧵 Epic travel day—three flights across four countries with my wife and kids. So naturally, here’s the etymology of the Hebrew word for airplane ✈️ 2/12 December 17th, 1903. Two bicycle mechanics from Ohio achieve the impossible—human flight. But they have no word for what they’ve just invented. They simply call it “The Machine.”

1/12 🕯️ Jews pray three times daily for a messiah to come. But here's the twist: the Torah never mentions this idea. At all.
So how did Jews go from having no messiah to obsessing over one? 🧵 2/12 The word "messiah" DOES appear in the Torah, but it just means "anointed priest"—nothing cosmic, nothing world-changing.
The answer to this transformation is heartbreak.

1/12 ✈️ How did Israeli flight attendants get their name? It took a lexicographer, an author, and a politician to give Israeli stewardesses the word "dayelet."
This is that wild story. 🧵 2/12 Let's start with the lexicographer: Eliezer Ben-Yehuda. Early 1900s, he's reviving Hebrew and needs a word for "waiter."

1/12 🎸 A 17-year-old Greek kid follows a girl to Israel. She's engaged. He stays anyway—and accidentally invents Israeli rock music.
This is the wild true story of Aris San. 2/12 1957. Aristidis Saïsanás is busking in Turkish tavernas when he meets an Israeli girl—and falls hard. She sails home. He follows on the next boat. No plan. No Hebrew. Just love.

🧵 Thread: The biblical word that stumped humanity for 2,000 years—and it's probably in your living room right now. 1/8 Meet agartal (אגרטל)—a Hebrew word that appears exactly ONCE in the entire Bible. In Ezra 1:9, it's listed among temple treasures: "Thirty gold agartalim, a thousand silver agartalim..."
But what ARE agartalim? 🤔

🧵 THREAD: The Hidden Meaning Behind Israel's Operation Name
You've probably heard the name: "Operation Rising Lion." But that's not what it's called in Hebrew.
The real name is עַם כְּלָבִיא – Am KeLavi — "A people like a lion." 1/7 It comes from the Book of Numbers. Balaam, the prophet hired to curse the Israelites, ends up saying: "Behold, a people rises like a lion…"
The curse becomes a blessing. They meant to harm us — and we rose. It's a name with teeth. 2/7

🧵 THREAD: The Arabic word that secretly names every magazine you read
You pick up a magazine. You load bullets into a machsanit (Hebrew). You think these are unrelated words. You're wrong. They're the EXACT same word. Here's the incredible story... 1/8 Both words trace back to Arabic "makhzan"—meaning storehouse. Renaissance Italian merchants trading with Arabs brought it back as "magazzino." It traveled to France as "magasin," then England as "magazine." 2/8

1/12 🧵 You know this symbol: @
In English, we call it the "at sign." But around the world? It's a zoo, a menu, and sometimes... a nipple.
Here's how one symbol became a thousand different things 👇 2/12The @ first appeared in 1536 in a Spanish merchant's letter as shorthand for "arroba"—a weight unit from Arabic.
French merchants used it for "at the price of." English just called it "at."
Then 1971 happened, and everything changed.

1/ Why is the jacaranda tree in Hebrew called sigalon?
The story is more poetic—and political—than you’d expect. 🌳🧵
#Hebrew #Etymology #Jacaranda 2/ The jacaranda isn’t native to Israel—it’s from Brazil. The name yakaranda comes from the Tupi-Guarani word for “fragrant.”

1/7 FASCINATING LANGUAGE FACT: How Modern Hebrew created its own version of the English "-able" suffix through a brilliant linguistic pivot that nobody planned. 2/7 While English simply adds "-able" to verbs (readable, breakable), Hebrew repurposed an ancient pattern—qatíl—that originally meant completely different things! "ʿashír" meant "rich," not "enrichable."