arena
uh-REE-nuh · noun
Origin
Borrowed from Latin arēna, meaning both "sand" and "arena." That Latin word came from an earlier form harēna, which traces back to Old Latin hasēna, possibly of Etruscan origin, with a possible Sabine cousin, fasēna.
This is Curio: one word's origin story, every morning. No feed, no backlog.
One short email each morning. Free; stop anytime. See a sample →
Journey
The word started as a plain word for sand, then narrowed in Latin to name the sand-covered floor of an amphitheater where contests were staged — and eventually the word came to stand for the whole space of contest itself.
More words
From Old Latin