Pronounced: KAP-chuh, noun
Notes: You probably know the meaning, but the background was interesting to me
Yesterday’s word
The word jalousie is
- a blind with adjustable horizontal slats for admitting light and air while excluding sun and rain
- a window made of adjustable glass louvers that control ventilation
First usage
Our word came into English in the late 1500s
Background / Comments
It turns out that our word is the French word for “jealousy”, so the fact that I confused our word with jealousy isn’t that far off of the origin, even if the meaning doesn’t mean that. It is not clear why the French word for “jealousy” came to mean what it does: it is speculated that because such slats allow one to see without being seen, such things were used by jealous people.
Richard's Vocabulary Word-of-the-Day 