What's In A Name? Nathan, Margaret, Marguerite, Margarita

The male name "Nathan" is derived from Hebrew "natan," which meant "gave;" thus perhaps, "gift of/from God." The name came into English from Christianity and the use of names from the Bible.

The female name "Margaret" is the more common spelling in English, but the name has various forms, some of which are forms from other languages, but which are used in English speaking countries, some examples: "Marguerite" in French, "Margherita" in Italian and "Margarita" in Spanish (see Word History below). It goes back to Greek "margarites," which meant "pearl," but which likely was borrowed by Greek from Persian "morwarid" (meaning "pearl").* Latin borrowed the word from Greek as "margarita," which spawned a number of variant names forms in the Latin-based languages, including Old French "Margarete." English borrowed the name circa 1200. The Italian form of the name is also used for a style of pizza with tomato sauce, basil and cheese, supposedly produced in the 1880s for Queen Margherita, the wife of the Italian king, Umberto. The red sauce, the green basil and the white cheese are the colors of the Italian flag. The Spanish form of the name, "Margarita," is also used for a tequila-based cocktail, likely invented in Mexico, but highly popular in the United States.**

I consulted the following, so for more information on any of the names see, "A World Of Baby Names" by Teresa Norman, published by Perigee/Penguin Group, New York, 2003. And I consulted, "A Greek-English Lexicon," by Henry George Liddell, Robert Scott, Roderick McKenzie, and Eric Arthur Barber, published by Oxford/Clarendon Press, 1940.

* Persian is a language from Indo Iranian, a branch of Indo European, thus it is related to English, but much further down the family tree, as English is from the Germanic branch of Indo European.

** For more on the history of the Margarita, see: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/the-history-of-the-margarita-57990212/?no-ist

WORD HISTORY:
Pearl-The more distant history of this word is unknown, but it goes back to Latin "perna," which meant "upper thigh, ham, leg," but it was used in some dialectal Latin-speaking Mediterranean areas for the name of mollusks, like clams and oysters, "seemingly" because many thought the shells resembled a "ham," or because they have a "foot" (leg), to move. Of course some such mollusks had pearls, and the word "pernula" was derived from "perna" as a diminutive ^ as the name for the product of these mollusks, "a pearl." ^^ Old French, a Latin-based language, got the term from Latin as "perle," and English borrowed it from French in the 1300s.

^ A diminutive is a word that makes something smaller or dearer; for example, duck, but duckling, pig, but piglet, both make the main animal smaller/younger, but diminutives can be for inanimate objects, like part, but particle; red, but reddish. As for making a word convey endearment, mother, but mom, and further, mommy. Often used for names, like John, but Johnny, Cynthia, but Cindy.

^^ The general Latin word for "pearl" long ago was "margarita."