11 everyday words that have weird and disturbing origins

Etymology is way more exciting than it sounds.

Thanks to the study of word origins, we now know that "mortgage" has an unsettling relationship with the afterworld, and that "muscles" once seemed to house tiny rodents.

The truth is, the only way to truly appreciate modern usage of the language is to know where words come from — for better or worse.

(H/T: Cracked, List25)

Muscle

Back when people had no clue about human biology (read: around the year 1525), some observant folks gazed at the rippling human body and thought muscles looked kind of like little mice underneath the skin.

Thankfully, modern English eventually truncated the creepy imagery of "mūsculus," which literally means "little mice" in Latin, into something more tame.

Punk

Mohawked teenagers may be "punks" today, but the term used to refer to a number of different kinds of people.

In prison slang, young boys could be punks. Further back, around 1590, a punk was a prostitute or a young male partner of a homosexual.

The seedy beginning gave way to the Sex Pistols-era music disciples.

Lemur

The beady-eyed animal gets its name from the paranormal.

Around the turn of the 18th century, the Latin term "lemures," or "spirits of the dead," emerged. It refers to lemurs' nocturnal sleeping pattern and haunting face.