Domino

Filed Under January 2007, columns 

Not counting that awful Van Morrison song.

Dear Word Detective: Why in the world are there so many uses for the word “domino”? Okay, well, two. I am referring not only to the black tile thing used in the game, but also the “masquerade” wear. — Val.

Whoa, you had me going there at first. As I’ve mentioned before, the great thing about writing this column is the opportunities it affords me, nearly daily, to doubt my own sanity. Thus I paused at the end of your first sentence and began wringing my memory for a third or fourth kind of “domino,” but all I could come up with was the name of that pizza chain.

While the “domino” game tile is probably the better known of the two kinds, the “domino” mask worn in a masquerade (itself from the Italian “maschera,” mask) is the older. “Domino” in this sense today usually refers to just a mask over the eyes (a la Zorro), but originally this “domino” also included a long hooded cloak, the whole shebang often being worn by masquerade partygoers who chose not to disguise themselves as some notable character (the Devil, Sponge Bob, etc.). The name “domino” for such a hooded cloak comes from the French “domino,” a similar hooded robe worn by monks and other clergy in the 16th century. “Domino” itself is derived from “dominus,” Latin for “lord or master,” and it has been suggested that the name was an abbreviation of “benedicamus Domino,” or “Let us now praise the Lord.” In any case, the full “domino” masquerade outfit appeared in English in the early 1700s, but by the 1800s “domino” usually referred to the mask alone.

“Domino” meaning the game piece, a small black tile marked with white dots, first appeared in English around 1801, and the connection, if any, with “domino” in the mask sense is uncertain. It may be that the white dots were thought to resemble eyes behind a mask. Alternatively, the name may have nothing to do with the costume and represent a reference to the verb form of the original Latin “dominus,” perhaps from the winner of the game shouting “Domino!” (”I am the master!”).

 

 

Comments

One Response to “Domino”

  1. schess on March 22nd, 2007 2:13 pm

    In the early 1960’s , (I would have been about 5 years old), I heard the term “domino” used in context of having babies - “she dominoed”. I am completely uncertain about other circumstances; it was a bit of overheard grown-up gossip about people I didn’t know (or wasn’t supposed to). I would guess that it was used in or dervied from the “winning the game” sense. It is not outside the realm of possibility (but pure speculation on my part) that the reference may have been to either a multiple birth (twins or triplets) - “hitting the jackpot” in a manner of speaking; or adding yet another child to an already large brood - more along the lines of the “domino effect” or “domino theory” of Communist expansion.

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