Welcome back, word fans. The second week of spring quarter is now fully under way, and we are well into all the joys (and the not-so-joys) of a new quarter. Speaking of spring and its newness, we have this week’s word, newfangled, brought to us courtesy of Barbara Petite.

Something that is newfangled is just that: new, or rather, novel. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, it is a recently created innovation or something “objectionably modern or different from what one is used to.” Someone can also be newfangled, in that they enjoy (perhaps a little too much) collecting new things or ideas (or hairstyles).

The Oxford English Dictionary also relates that an earlier and now obsolete form, newfangle (note the lack of the “d”), used as an adjective, means “caught up in a new experience,” which is appropriate if one is truly enamored with the sensation that comes with all things new.

It comes from the Middle English word newfanglyd, also meaning “found of novelty,” according to the American Heritage Dictionary, which, in turn, is related to the Middle Dutch nieuvingel.

Our English word is composed of “new” and “fang,” with the latter not actually referring to an animal’s sharp teeth, but rather to the verb “fang,” in the sense of capturing, taking or seizing (hence the notion of newfangled things taking on a life of their own and “capturing” our attention, however briefly).

It’s possibly related to the Faroese word fangla, the Oxford English Dictionary speculates, meaning “to try to catch hold of.” Faroese is the linguistic descendent of Old Norse, and it is spoken on the Faroe Islands, a remote and frosty archipelago located between Scotland and Iceland. Incidentally, “new fangle” (newfangled as two words and the result of an apparently erroneous etymological analysis) refers to a silly new fashion or foppery.

As noted by the Oxford English Dictionary, the word first emerged in the 1300s and was used by Chaucer (c.1340–1400) in his Canterbury Tales, in the Squire’s Tale, around 1386, with the line (and please endure this obtusely old spelling), “So newefangel been they of hir mete / And louen nouelries of propre kynde.”

A more intelligible (and also much later) example can be found in 1603, in John Flurio’s Montaigne’s Essayes, or Morall, Politike and Millitarie Discourses (his spelling, not mine, of his translation of Michel Eyquem de Montaigne’s Essais), with the snippet of a line, “Other like new-fangled and vicious introductions.”

According to the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Flurio (1553–1625) was a truly prolific translator, whose Italian language manuals and massive Italian-English dictionary, Queen Anna’s New World of Words, earned him an influential position teaching Italian to English royalty. A contemporary of Shakespeare (some say he was Shakespeare, although that’s a bit of a stretch), he helped foster England’s fascination with Italian humanism (and its cultural and intellectual newfangledism).

Even if you’re not a newfangle when it comes to words, I dearly wish that this brief foray into the origins of newfangled was enjoyable, and maybe even newfangled, as it were. If you have any word ideas for next week’s column, please send them to features@dailyuw.com. Until next time, cheerio!

Reach columnist Will Mari at features@dailyuw.com.