The word "easel" (an upright support used for displaying and/or working on something resting upon it, usually a canvas being painted on) comes from the German word "esel" and the Dutch word "ezel", both of which refer to an easel, and to an ass(donkey). The use of the word for "donkey" refering to an "easel" is similar to the way "horse" is used in "sawhorse" (a wooden frame which supports work in progress).

Nitric acid will dissolve most metals, with gold being one of the few exceptions. Nitric acid has been used for a long to confirm the presence of gold in items, and this is the origin of the colloquial term "acid test".

Chortle was a word coined by Lewis Carroll in Through the looking glass in 1872. "'O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!' He chortled in his joy." Perhaps Lewis Carroll would chortle a bit himself to find that people are still using the word chortle, which he coined in Through the Looking-Glass, published in 1872. In any case, Carroll had constructed his word well, combining the words chuckle and snort. This type of word is called a blend or a portmanteau word. In Through the Looking-Glass Humpty Dumpty uses portmanteau to describe the word slithy, saying, "It's like a portmanteau—there are two meanings packed up into one word" (the meanings being "lithe" and "slimy").

As a loanword from Norwegian, 'fjord' is the only word in the English language to start with the letters 'fj'.

The term "sniper" is derived from "snipe", which is a bird that was difficult to hunt. The term dates back to the 18th century.