What's In A Name: Jane, Jeanne, Joan, Zachary

Jane-This is a feminine form of John;" and thus, it goes back to transliterated Hebrew "Yohanan," "graced by God." Greek took the name as "Ioannes" (transliterated), which was then borrowed by Latin as "Ioannes," the feminine form of which was "Johanna." This passed into Latin-based French as "Jehanne/Jehane," and then "Jeanne," which was taken by English in the Middle Ages as "Jeanne," but also in the altered English form "Jane." "Joan" was taken by English directly from the Latin form "Johanna," and for awhile in England, it was used more than "Jane," which then overtook it during the 1600s. The use of "Jane" has declined in England, other parts of Britain and in the United States in more recent times, which prompts me to ask, "Whatever happened to Baby Jane?" * Likewise with the name "Joan," but I'm not going to ask, "Whatever happened to Baby Joan." 

Zachary-The most common short forms of this name are "Zac" and "Zack." The name is from transliterated Hebrew "Zekaryah," meaning, "Yahweh remembered," which was rendered in transliterated Greek as "Zacharias," and which was taken by Latin as "Zaccharias." Seems to have been Anglicized as "Zachary" circa 1600, although it has never been highly popular until more recent times in English.  


* For an article I did on the movie of that name, here is the link:  http://pontificating-randy.blogspot.com/2016/09/whatever-happened-to-baby-jane-featured.html

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.

WORD HISTORY:
Daunt/Daunting-This word, distantly related to "tame," an original English word from Germanic, goes back to Indo European "demeh," which had the notion, "to compel, to force;" thus also, "to break the wildness from, to get an animal accustomed to being around humans." This gave its Latin offspring "domare," which meant, "to tame, to subdue," and an infinitive form of which was "domitare," with the same meaning. This passed to Latin-based Old French as "donter/danter," which meant, "to control, to hold in check;" thus also, "to tame," but also, "to dominate, to subdue;" which gave the word a "sense of fear" as a part of the meaning. English borrowed the word in the early 1300sas "danten/daunten," with those meanings, but by circa 1500, the "sense of fear" part had come to the fore; and thus, "to instill fear, to intimidate, to bring fear, to frighten," became the main notion of the word, which brought "daunting," the adjective, meaning, "intimidating;" often heard in the expression, "daunting task;" that is, "an intimidating task, a job that inspires fear."