Latin Spirare

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi.

Hi, who’s this?

This is Barb Shaver.

I’m from Wales Elementary.

I’m actually in my classroom right now, ready to ask you a question.

Oh, wonderful.

Where is Wales Elementary?

Wales Elementary is in Wales, Wisconsin.

Okay, very nice.

And so you’re in the classroom now.

Are you surrounded by young, bright minds?

Well, unfortunately, they’ve been kind of waiting eagerly, but they went off to lunch right now.

But I do have two of my fifth grade students here right now.

They are waiting.

Okay.

Yeah.

We can’t really compare against lunch, I’m sure.

Unfortunately not.

It’s pizza day, right?

Probably.

Well, what’s on your mind there?

Well, part of our word study program here involves having some of our students learn Latin and Greek roots.

Excellent.

Wow.

Yay.

Yeah, isn’t that fun?

Yeah.

So my students, me and Sarah, came to me one day and wanted to ask me a question about one of the words and the roots.

And I gave them my suggestion, but I said that perhaps they’d want to contact you and ask the question.

Oh, great.

Okay, yeah, they’re there with you now.

Right, so could I have Mia talk to you on the phone right now?

Sure.

Okay, here she is.

Hi, I’m Mia.

Hi, Mia.

Hi, Mia, how are you doing?

I’m Martha, and that’s Grant over there.

Hi.

Hi, so you’re in the fifth grade?

Yes, I am.

Okay, great.

And what are you studying right now?

Greek and Latin roots.

Yay!

Okay, very good.

So which one are you asking about?

You know, I’ve got an expert over here on the other side of me.

Her name is Martha.

She’s studied this stuff for years.

Well, the root spear, that’s S-P-I-R, means to breathe.

Right.

But the word conspire means something entirely different.

So I’m wondering how does spear go with conspire?

Aha. Excellent question. I’m really glad you asked that.

And so the first part of the word, Mia, C-O-N, what do you know about its history?

I have no idea about that history.

I think there might be a clue to the answer in that.

Okay. And yes, the Latin root spirare means to breathe.

And you’ve probably seen that root in other words, right, Mia?

Yes.

Respiration.

Respiration.

Right, right. And the S-P-I-R there means to breathe.

And so respiration is breathing again and again, which is a good thing, right?

Yes, it is.

To inspire somebody is to breathe into them.

Yes, to breathe in an idea.

There you go.

Wonderful.

Okay. And so you’ve got this great question about conspire, which has that same root, but really means to sort of plot or make a secret agreement, right?

Yes.

So you’re saying, what the heck does that have to do with breathing?

Yeah.

Okay. Well, I think we can help you with that because if you go back to the early, early, early Latin word, conspirare, which is the source of conspire, it means, well, imagine being really, really in harmony with somebody, Mia.

You’re really close. You’re really united. You agree on everything. You finish each other’s sentences.

You’re so close that you even breathe together.

That’s the idea, that you’re very, very close and in agreement.

And over time, that word that involved agreeing with somebody or harmonizing with somebody took a little turn and meant to agree to do something, and then to agree to do something like a plot.

It just changed a little bit, and the con is with, so breathing with, literally.

Very interesting.

That’s very interesting.

So it could be like, say your best friend, you do everything together.

Like my best friend is Sarah, but I don’t really plot together to do stuff with her.

But if we were like really, really super close and then we turned evil, say somehow.

Never.

Then that would be what we would do.

Exactly.

Yeah, bingo.

That’s exactly it.

You would be conspiring.

You would be so close.

You’re breathing together and figuring out, you know, what to do.

Very good.

Thank you.

Well, you must be doing really well in school, Mia.

Yeah, I get A’s.

Excellent.

Well, that’s what we like to hear.

Excellent.

A Martha in training, clearly.

Mia, drop us a line sometime and let us know how your studies are going.

If you’ve got any stumpers, I’m volunteering Martha’s help, okay?

Okay.

Okay, thanks a lot.

Thank you. Good luck.

Okay.

Bye-bye.

Can you put your teacher back on?

Yeah, sure.

Okay.

Hi.

Well, you must be a great teacher, Barbara.

We appreciate your calling.

Thanks, Barbara.

Thanks for helping us out.

Okay.

It’s a pleasure. Bye-bye.

Take care.

Okay, bye-bye.

Wow.

That’s great. That’s fantastic.

Yeah.

There are people out there in the front lines struggling to make young minds even brighter, and she’s one of them, right?

Give us a call. It doesn’t matter how old you are or what you’re doing, as long as it’s got something to do with language, 877-929-9673, or tell us about an email, words@waywordradio.org.