- The words "vaccine" and "buckaroo" share a root word! The Latin "vacca," meaning "cow"!! This is because the first vaccine was derived from cowpox, and buckaroo comes from spanish "vaquero," meaning "cowboy"!
- The state of New Mexico was NOT named after the country of Mexico, and in fact was named that several centuries EARLIER than the country!! (New Mexico has been called that since 1560s, while Mexico only gained that name in the 1820s.) Both of them are named after the Valley of Mexico, which is the location of modern-day Mexico City! At the time of New Mexico's naming, the location of modern-day Mexico was called New Spain!
- Speaking of state names, California was likely named after a fictional location in a 16th-century Spanish romance novel! In Las Sergas de Esplandián, there's a fictional island named California, named after its ruler, Queen Calafia (whose name possibly comes from the Arabic word "khalif")!!
- Nobody knows where the word "dog" comes from.
My favorite fact is that a lot of places in America have Native Names that are just literal translations of what the place is. Manhattan in my Grandpa's tongue, Munsee, means "that place over there where we gather trees we make bows with."
[edit] Apparently this story is told about several other words as well, such as kangaroo, and it's the type of etymology that one should always doubt.
The conquistadors first visited what is now known as the Yucatán Penninsula, they asked the folks already living there what the name of the place was, and duly mis-recorded the answer as Yucatán. We're not entirely sure what it actually means, but one proposed translation is:
"What? I don't understand what you're saying."
Even Terry "Your Finger You Fool" Pratchett didn't come up with something as funny as that.
