Some English Words That Mean Very Different Things Now

Photo by Glen Carrie on Unsplash

Language drifts and changes. And some words mean very different things now from what they meant in the past.

I thought it would be fun to go through some examples.

Coward

Today, coward means somebody who’s, well, not brave. Somebody who runs away from things.

However, it used to mean cow-ward, that is to say somebody who looks after cows. Which if you’ve ever met a cow is a pretty brave job, to be honest.

Awful

“That burger was awful.” Yeah. Bad, low quality, terrible.

But awful used to actually mean frightening. It’s short for “full of awe” and awe is a specific kind of fear, the kind of fear you feel when you, say, look at the Grand Canyon and simultaneously realize it’s beautiful and you don’t want to fall in.

Photo by Fa Barboza on Unsplash

Flirt

It used to mean making a jerky motion, not acting like you were into something.

I suspect the switch here may date to the Victorian era. You flirted a fan…and then you flirted with a fan (fan language was a way for a woman to subtly…