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This is The Illusionist, in which I, Helen Zoltzman, am trapped in a linguistic escape

room. There are a few swear words in today's episode. You are welcome. On with the show.

A thousand or so years ago, the word gossip meant something quite different. A family member.

The word broke down to God's Sib, like a God sibling. Although then, the Sib wasn't necessarily

a sibling, it was more general. It could refer to anyone you were related to.

And over the next few hundred years, more specifically, gossip were the close female family and friends

who would attend to a woman during labor. She would be sequestered and maybe half a dozen

gossip would gather in the room to take care of the mother and help deliver the baby

and witness the birth for the purposes of the baby's baptism, at which these gossip's

God Sibs would be the child's sponsors. And during these confinements, the women would

keep each other company and talk. So you can see how the word gossip would evolve to mean

the kind of confidential chat you'd have with someone you're close to. But by the mid-16th century,

...