diva

Before diva described a singer who could bring an opera house to its knees, it simply meant “goddess.” Italian borrowed the Latin dīva, the feminine of dīvus, and English adopted it in 1864 as an elegant title for a distinguished woman singer—essentially, a mortal permitted a little celestial drama. Its distant ancestor, Proto-Indo-European *deywós, belonged to a family of words connected with the shining sky, which also produced Latin deus “god” and dies “day”; diurnal, meaning “daily,” is therefore a surprisingly close linguistic cousin. Opera helped turn the word into a backstage social category: magnificent voice, impossible demands, and perhaps a manager dispatched to locate exactly the right flowers. Today diva can still be admiring, but it may also mean someone who expects the world to revolve around her—quite appropriate for a word that began in heaven.