CULTURE WATCH : Election With a Latin Beat

It’s election year and, as a result, some words are being thrown around a lot more often than usual. In case you’ve been wondering how they came into our vocabularies, here are a few of them and their derivations to mull over:

* Candidate is one who aspires to or is nominated or qualified for an office. The word came into the English language about 1600. Etymologists say it is from a Latin word meaning clothed in white, from the tradition in ancient Rome of candidates for an office wearing white togas as a symbol of purity.

* Incumbent --Sometimes a candidate is the present holder of the office. Incumbent was added to the English vocabulary in the 15th Century. The original denotation of the Latin word it comes from was to lie down.

* Poll --In the 13th Century, the word meant the top or back of a head and came to mean the counting or entering of votes and, also, to vote at a poll or to give one’s vote.

Poll tax, a tax on heads (or, in other words, people) came to mean a tax that one had to pay in some states to vote.