Why are butterflies called "butterflies"? - Big Questions (Ep. 13)

Hi, I'm Craig. I used to be a caterpillar, but since then I have blossomed into a beautiful butterfly

And this is Mentofloss on YouTube. Today, I'm going to answer, Made of Awesome Forever's Big Question

I've heard that butterflies were once called flutterbyes, and that people mishearing slash mispronouncing it changed it to butterfly

Is this true? If not, why are butterflies called butterflies? The fact that butterflies were once called flutterbyes is a popular story, but like many popular stories, it's not true

So, today I'm going to tell you where the word butterfly did come from. Let's get started. So the word butterfly evolved from these two words from middle English and old English

As you can see, the spelling is varied, but it's pretty hard to argue that they were ever called flutterbyes

Except for in the book, The Last of the Really Great Wangdoodles by Julie Andrews, but that's probably not what you meant

Experts aren't totally sure why the insects were initially given the name, though. Some believe it's because the butterflies have wings that are the color of butter

but most people dismiss this theory on account of it being really dumb because there are many butterflies that have many different colors They not all the yellow butterflies A more fun explanation is found in the Oxford Dictionary as most fun explanations are It claims that the English word was actually a translation from the Dutch word for butterfly

The word literally translates to butter-s-h-h-that's fun. Apparently as the Dutch were observing butterfly excrement, as I often do, they realized it looked

like butter. A final explanation is that people believed that witches used to turn themselves into butterflies

Then they would track down and eat dairy products like butter. I'm not saying that Paul adene is a witch, but this is some pretty good evidence

English isn't the only language that has interesting ways of describing butterflies. The ancient Greek word for butterfly was a synonym for Seoul

The Latin word gave us the term pavilion because a large tent looks like wings

And the Russian word can also mean bow tie. I know I didn't say the other words, but I want to say that one

Can I say that one? Babachka. Thanks for watching Mental Floss on YouTube made with the help of these babachas

If you have a big question of your own, leave it in the comments below. Hope you fly on by next week