Daffodil

The story of the word

The flower is an asphodel that lost an s and gained a d. Medieval Latin affodillus dropped the opening syllable, English had affodill, and the d appeared in the sixteenth century for reasons nobody has settled; the usual suspect is a Dutch article, de affodil, fused onto the noun. The asphodel of Greek poetry is a different plant altogether: Homer's dead wander an ἀσφοδελὸς λειμών, a meadow of asphodel, and the daffodil inherited the name by confusion rather than resemblance.

How it travelled

Ancient Greek → Medieval Latin → English

First recorded

16th century