Ripley's Believe It or Not by Ripley’s Believe It or Not! for February 22, 2018

http://laughingsquid.com/wp-content/uploads/Vintage_Headless_Man.jpg

Interesting fact: Earth is also the only planet named after dirt. Someone was having a bad day??

photoshopping dating back two centuries… wow

I always thought it was named after Eartha Kitt.

“Earth” was never meant to be a proper name.

It was just a descriptive term for the ground under our feet….

terra firma….. before we knew it was a “planet”…

and then it became our word for “this big clod of dirt we ride around on.”

So on other planets they could probably say the same thing.

Martians or Venusians would use some similar descriptive word for their own planet…

you know…. like, whatever is Venusian for “dirt ball” ….

And their version of Ripley’s would say it’s the only one not named after a celestial being….

Cos they named what we call our “Earth” after one of their gods or goddesses.

So what god or goddess is the moon named after?

It’s the only planet not named after a Roman god or goddess; some of the sources I checked suggest “Earth” might be related to the name of a goddess among proto-Germanic peoples.

Mother earth.

Obviously, the headless photo craze got started in Sleepy Hollow. ;-)

Not true. The yet-to-be-named ‘planet 9’ is by definition not named after a god or goddess…..or anything else.

Not true. The yet-to-be-named ‘planet 9’ is by definition not named after a god or goddess…..or anything else.

The Latin name for the Earth is “Terra” who was a primeval Roman Goddess

Tellus is a Latin word meaning “Earth” and may refer to: Terra (mythology), the ancient Roman earth mother goddess; Tellus of Athens, a citizen of ancient Athens who was thought to be the happiest of men.

The earliest gods, according to ancient Greek mythology, were Gaia (Earth) and Ouranous (Sky).

I read these as a a kid but most of them were old and outdated and the art wasn’t all that great. I LOVE it that this is new, updated, reveleant, and has great art!

The Schulzes, apparently, refused to be discommoded.

our word earth comes from the norse- erda, goddess of the earth

I’m pretty sure Earth is literally named after the ground. As in our ancestors couldn’t think of a more appropriate name for it other than “that thing we stand upon.” In fact, I’m pretty sure if we ever meet aliens we’ll find out that their own planets will be named after whatever THEIR word for the ground is, unless they’re aquatic and name their world after whatever their word for water is.

And you have to be careful with words that mean “world”, because the original meaning of “world” is “universe”.