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Edwin Ashworth
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Jonah
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Consider the example of the etymology of the phrase "10 gallon hat":

Cattle drivers and ranchers in Texas and the Southwest often crossed paths with Mexican vaqueros who sported braided hatbands—called “galóns” in Spanish—on their sombreros. A “10 galón” sombrero was a hat with a large enough crown that it could hold 10 hatbands, but American cowboys may have anglicized the word to “gallon” and started referring to their own sombrero-inspired headgear as “10-gallon hats.”

-- From history.com

The veracity of this particular etymology aside, there are words and phrases whose origin is a misunderstanding or mishearing of some original word or phrase -- foreign or otherwise. This mistake then sticks, and the misheard word becomes the dominant, standard word in daily usage.

Is there a linguistic term for words that originate this way, or for this specific process of word transformation?

Consider the example of the etymology of the phrase "10 gallon hat":

Cattle drivers and ranchers in Texas and the Southwest often crossed paths with Mexican vaqueros who sported braided hatbands—called “galóns” in Spanish—on their sombreros. A “10 galón” sombrero was a hat with a large enough crown that it could hold 10 hatbands, but American cowboys may have anglicized the word to “gallon” and started referring to their own sombrero-inspired headgear as “10-gallon hats.”

-- From history.com

The veracity of this particular etymology aside, there are words and phrases whose origin is a misunderstanding or mishearing some original word or phrase -- foreign or otherwise. This mistake then sticks, and the misheard word becomes the dominant, standard word in daily usage.

Is there a linguistic term for words that originate this way, or for this specific process of word transformation?

Consider the example of the etymology of the phrase "10 gallon hat":

Cattle drivers and ranchers in Texas and the Southwest often crossed paths with Mexican vaqueros who sported braided hatbands—called “galóns” in Spanish—on their sombreros. A “10 galón” sombrero was a hat with a large enough crown that it could hold 10 hatbands, but American cowboys may have anglicized the word to “gallon” and started referring to their own sombrero-inspired headgear as “10-gallon hats.”

-- From history.com

The veracity of this particular etymology aside, there are words and phrases whose origin is a misunderstanding or mishearing of some original word or phrase -- foreign or otherwise. This mistake then sticks, and the misheard word becomes the dominant, standard word in daily usage.

Is there a linguistic term for words that originate this way, or for this specific process of word transformation?

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Jonah
Jonah
  • 263
  • 1
  • 7

Word for "words whose origin is another, misheard word"?

Consider the example of the etymology of the phrase "10 gallon hat":

Cattle drivers and ranchers in Texas and the Southwest often crossed paths with Mexican vaqueros who sported braided hatbands—called “galóns” in Spanish—on their sombreros. A “10 galón” sombrero was a hat with a large enough crown that it could hold 10 hatbands, but American cowboys may have anglicized the word to “gallon” and started referring to their own sombrero-inspired headgear as “10-gallon hats.”

-- From history.com

The veracity of this particular etymology aside, there are words and phrases whose origin is a misunderstanding or mishearing some original word or phrase -- foreign or otherwise. This mistake then sticks, and the misheard word becomes the dominant, standard word in daily usage.

Is there a linguistic term for words that originate this way, or for this specific process of word transformation?