The liver: A history of the anatomical terms in English and Romanian

Abstract

The aim of this study is to investigate the origins, history, and evolution of the words describing one of the splanchnic viscera, the liver, as they appear in English and Romanian languages. The better to explore this topic, I will compare the etymology of the analyzed terms; in addition, I will explore the cultural history, literature, traditions, and beliefs which have shaped the evolution of these terms. The comparative study of the words, as they appear in English and Romanian, could offer valuable insights if we consider these languages as instances of the two subgroups of the Indo-European family, the Germanic and the Romance languages, spoken in the modern Western countries.