silent t castle whistle wrestle

The English word castle and the French word chateau
are both from the same Latin word: castellum.
This watercolor was painted by the German artist
Albrecht Durer in  1502. 

Castle was spoken as castel before the year 1100. The word had come to England with the invading Roman soldiers who spoke the Latin word: castellum.

The French had spoken the word as chastel. The Spanish had merged the Latin word with Arabic al-qasr to say: alcazar.

You are speaking words passed down to you from the Roman soldiers who conquered England by the year 55 BC.
Let that be an honor as you say:

castle       thistle      bustle      rustle  

wrestle     whistle    hustle       turtle

Bustle comes from an ancient Norse word: busk, meaning to make oneself ready.

Hustle comes from the Old Dutch word: hutseln, meaning to shake things up, to hurry to make things ready.
Rustle, from the old Flemish: ruysselen, referring to the soft, fluttering sounds leaves make when the wind stirs them.

Wrestle from wrest, coming from truly ancient days in India: wer, meaning to twist and turn; writhe and wrestle come from wer. (writhe, say wri th, long i: My puppy was writhing in pain after it stuck its nose into a prickly thistle plant.)

Thistle, from ancient India: (s)teig, meaning a point, and prickly; Old English had it as distel.

Whistle comes to us from whisper, which comes from ancient India: kwei, meaning a hissing, or a quiet sound. Old English wrote whistle: hwistlian.

Turtle, do you say turtle with a silent t? Webster's dictionary shows tur tle, with the t spoken; from the Latin: tartaruca, then later, Old French tortue.

Notice the lessons on the right side of this blog. Also, you might like to look at my books to strengthen your child's reading skills. All my books teach the tricky phonics and a special comprehension method; the lessons are fun, interesting, and proven.

I use eBay as my website. Search Instant Reading Help all my books will pop up for you.

Contact me in the comment box below for a limited edition 200 page glossary of word origins.

Have fun with words. Thank you for visiting my blog, Mary Maisner