The word 'goodbye' is a contraction of the phrase 'God be with ye.'

The longest sentence in serious literature appears in Faulkner's 'Absalom, Absalom!' — 1,288 words.

English has the largest vocabulary of any language — the Oxford English Dictionary contains over 600,000 words.

The English word 'war' derives from the Old High German 'werra,' meaning strife or confusion.

The word 'dinosaur' means 'terrible lizard' — coined by Richard Owen in 1842.

The word 'salary' derives from 'sal' (salt) — Roman soldiers were paid a salt allowance.

All human languages have nouns and verbs — but many lack adjectives or other categories found in English.

The word 'disaster' comes from Italian 'disastro' — 'bad star' — reflecting ancient beliefs about celestial influence on fate.

Language is transmitted culturally, not genetically — children adopted across language communities learn the local language perfectly.