Word of the Week: mlýn – ‘mill’
The Romans called a mill a molīna, literally a ‘grinder’, as the root of the word is the Latin verb molere ‘to grind’ (see also: your molar teeth).
Many languages have got their word for ‘mill’ from molīna. For example, without it, Paris wouldn’t have its Moulin Rouge. Introduced to the Slavs along with the technology of milling, the Latin word also became Proto-Slavic *mъlinъ, and later Czech mlýn.
The word likely passed through the Germanic languages into its way to Czech. In German today, the word is Mühle, just as it is mill in English. Over the centuries, both the German and the English have lost the N of molīna, but Czech preserves it. Mylen, the word in Old English, is visibly closer to mlýn.
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Word of the Week
Danny Bate, our resident linguist, offers a selection of everyday Czech words, to discuss their history and show how interconnected and familiar the Czech language can be.
