Online Etymology Dictionary

twisted (adj.): "perverted, mentally strange," 1900, from twist (n.) in a sense of "mental peculiarity, perversion" first attested 1811.
twister (n.): 1570s, "one who spins thread," agent noun from twist (v.). Meaning "tornado" is attested from 1881, American English.
twisty (adj.): "attractively feminine," 1970s slang, is from twist "girl" (1928), apparently from rhyming slang twist and twirl (1924).
twit (v.): 1520s, shortened form of atwite, from Old English ætwitan "to blame, reproach," from æt "at" + witan "to blame," from Proto-Germanic *witanan (cf. Old English wite, Old Saxon witi, Old Norse viti "punishment, torture;" Old High German wizzi "punishment," wizan "to punish;" Dutch verwijten, Old High German firwizan, German verweisen "to reproach, reprove," Gothic fraweitan "to avenge"), from PIE root *weid- "to see" (see vision). For sense evolution, cf. Latin animadvertere, literally "to give heed to, observe," later "to chastise, censure, punish."
twit (n.): "foolish, stupid and ineffectual person," 1934, British slang, popular 1950s-60s, crossed over to U.S. with British sitcoms. It probably developed from twit (v.) in the sense of "reproach," but it may be influenced by nitwit.
twitch (v.): late 12c., to-twic-chen "pull apart with a quick jerk," related to Old English twiccian "to pluck," from Proto-Germanic *twikjonan (cf. Low German twicken, Dutch twikken, Old High German gizwickan, German zwicken "to pinch, tweak"). Related: Twitched; twitching. The noun is attested from 1520s.
twitter (v.): late 14c., twiteren, in reference to birds, of imitative origin (cf. Old High German zwizziron, German zwitschern, Danish kvidre, Old Swedish kvitra). The noun meaning "condition of tremulous excitement" is attested from 1670s. The microblogging service with the 140-character limit was introduced in 2006.
twitterpated (adj.): 1942, apparently first attested in the Walt Disney movie "Bambi" (there also was a song by that name but it was not in the studio release of the film), a past participle adjective formed from twitter + pate (2) "head" (cf. flutterpated, 1894).
Thumper: Why are they acting that way?
Friend Owl: Why, don't you know? They're twitterpated.
Flower, Bambi, Thumper: Twitterpated?
Friend Owl: Yes. Nearly everybody gets twitterpated in the springtime. For example: You're walking along, minding your own business. You're looking neither to the left, nor to the right, when all of a sudden you run smack into a pretty face. Woo-woo! You begin to get weak in the knees. Your head's in a whirl. And then you feel light as a feather, and before you know it, you're walking on air. And then you know what? You're knocked for a loop, and you completely lose your head!
Thumper: Gosh, that's awful.
twixt (prep.): c.1300, short for betwixt.
twizzle (v.): "to twist, form by twisting" (transitive), 1788, apparently a made-up word suggested by twist.
two (n.): Old English twa, fem. and neuter form of twegen "two" (see twain), from Proto-Germanic *twai (cf. Old Saxon and Old Frisian twene, twa, Old Norse tveir, tvau, Dutch twee, Old High German zwene, zwo, German zwei, Gothic twai), from PIE *duwo (cf. Sanskrit dvau, Avestan dva, Greek duo, Latin duo, Old Welsh dou, Lithuanian dvi, Old Church Slavonic duva, first element in Hittite ta-ugash "two years old").

Dance style two-step is recorded from 1900. Twofer is first recorded 1911 (originally in reference to cigars), from two for (a dollar, etc.). Two cheers for _____, expressing qualified enthusiasm first recorded 1951 in E.M. Forster's title "Two Cheers for Democracy." Two-dimensional is recorded from 1883; figurative sense of "lacking substance or depth" is attested from 1934.
two bits (n.): "quarter," 1730, in reference to the Mexican real, a large coin that was divided into eight bits; see bit (n.1). Two bits would have equaled a quarter of the coin. Hence two-bit (adj.) "cheap, tawdry," first recorded 1929. Cf. piece of eight; see piece (n.)).
two-faced (adj.): also two faced, "deceitful," 1610s.
two-time (v.): "to deceive, cheat, betray," 1924, perhaps from notion of "to have two at a time." An earlier reference (1922) in a Kentucky criminal case and involves a double-cross or betrayal, without a romance angle. Related: two-timing (adj.); two-timer.
twofold: Old English tweofeald; see two + -fold.
Tyburn: place of public execution for Middlesex from c.1200 to 1783; it stood at the junction of modern Oxford Street, Bayswater Road and Edgware Road.
tycoon (n.): 1857, title given by foreigners to the shogun of Japan (said to have been used by his supporters when addressing foreigners, as an attempt to convey that the shogun was more important than the emperor), from Japanese taikun "great lord or prince," from Chinese tai "great" + kiun "lord." Transferred meaning "important person" is attested from 1861, in reference to U.S. president Abraham Lincoln (in Hay's diary); specific application to "businessman" is post-World War I.
tyke (n.): c.1400, "cur, mongrel," from Old Norse tik "bitch," related to Middle Low German tike. Also applied in Middle English to a low-bred or lazy man. The meaning "child" is from 1902, though it was used in playful reproof from 1894.
Tylenol (n.): introduced 1955 as the name of an elixir for children, trade name originally registered by McNeil Laboratories, Philadelphia, Pa., from elements abstracted from N-acetyl-para-aminophenol, the chemical name of its active compound.
Tyler: surname, 12c., literally "tile-maker."
tympanic (adj.): 1808, from tympanum + -ic.
tympanist (n.): 1610s, "one who plays on a drum," from tympanum + -ist; since mid-19c. specifically of players on kettledrums.
tympanum (n.): "drum of the ear," 1610s, from Medieval Latin tympanum, introduced in this sense by Italian anatomist Gabriello Fallopio (1523-1562), from Latin tympanum "drum," from Greek tympanon "a drum, panel of a door," from root of typtein "to beat, strike" (see type (n.)). Cf. Old English timpan "drum, timbrel, tambourine," from Latin tympanum. The modern meaning "a drum" is attested in English from 1670s.
type (n.): late 15c., "symbol, emblem," from Latin typus "figure, image, form, kind," from Greek typos "dent, impression, mark, figure, original form," from root of typtein "to strike, beat," from PIE root *(s)teu- "to strike, cut, hew" (see steep (adj.)). Extended 1713 to printing blocks with letters carved on them. The meaning "general form or character of some kind, class" is first in English 1843, though it had that sense in Latin and Greek. To be someone's type "be the sort of person that person is attracted to" is recorded from 1934.
type (v.): "to write with a typewriter," 1888; see type (n.). Related: Typed; typing.
typecast: also type-cast, with reference to actors, 1946 (adj. and v.), perhaps a deliberate pun on the verbal phrase in the print type founding sense (attested from 1847). See type (n.) + cast (v.).
typeface (n.): also type-face, 1873, from type (n.) + face (n.).
typewriter (n.): in the mechanical sense, 1868, from type (n.) + writer.
typhoid (adj.): 1800, literally "resembling typhus," from typhus + suffix from Greek -oeides "like," from eidos "form, shape" (see -oid). The noun is from 1861, a shortened form of typhoid fever (1845), so called because it was originally thought to be a variety of typhus. Typhoid Mary (1909) was Mary Mallon (d.1938), a typhoid carrier who worked as a cook and became notorious after it was learned she had unwittingly infected hundreds in U.S.
typhoon (n.): Tiphon "violent storm, whirlwind, tornado," 1550s, from Greek typhon "whirlwind," personified as a giant, father of the winds, perhaps from typhein "to smoke" (cf. typhus). The meaning "cyclone, violent hurricane of India or the China Seas" (1580s) is first recorded in T. Hickock's translation of an account in Italian of a voyage to the East Indies by Caesar Frederick, a merchant of Venice:
concerning which Touffon ye are to vnderstand, that in the East Indies often times, there are not stormes as in other countreys; but euery 10. or 12. yeeres there are such tempests and stormes, that it is a thing incredible, but to those that haue seene it, neither do they know certainly what yeere they wil come. ["The voyage and trauell of M. Caesar Fredericke, Marchant of Venice, into the East India, and beyond the Indies"]
This sense of the word, in reference to titanic storms in the East Indies, first appears in Europe in Portuguese in the mid-16th century. It aparently is from tufan, a word in Arabic, Persian, and Hindi meaning "big cyclonic storm." Yule ["Hobson-Jobson," London, 1903] writes that "the probability is that Vasco [da Gama] and his followers got the tufao ... direct from the Arab pilots." The Arabic word sometimes is said to be from Greek typhon, but other sources consider it purely Semitic, though the Greek word might have influenced the form of the word in English. Al-tufan occurs several times in the Koran for "a flood or storm" and also for Noah's Flood. Chinese (Cantonese) tai fung "a great wind" also might have influenced the form or sense of the word in English, and that term and the Indian one may have had some mutual influence; toofan still means "big storm" in India.
typhus (n.): acute infectious fever, 1785, from Modern Latin (De Sauvages, 1759), from Greek typhos "stupor caused by fever," literally "smoke," from typhein "to smoke," related to typhos "blind," typhon "whirlwind," ultimately origin unknown. The disease so called from the prostration that it causes.
typical (adj.): c.1600, "symbolic, emblematic," from Medieval Latin typicalis "symbolic," from Late Latin typicus "of or pertaining to a type," from Greek typikos, from typos "impression" (see type (n.)). Sense of "characteristic" is first recorded 1850. Related: Typically.
typify (v.): 1630s, "to represent by a symbol," from Latin typus (see type (n.)) + -fy. Meaning "to serve as a typical specimen of some class, etc." is attested from 1854.
typist (n.): 1843, from type (n.) + -ist.
typo (n.): 1816, short for typographer; 1892 as short for typographical error (see typography).
typographic (adj.): 1778, from Medieval Latin typographicus (16c.), from typographus, from Greek typos (see type (n.)) + graphos "writing," from graphein "to write" (see -graphy).
typographical (adj.): "pertaining to typography," 1590s; see typography + -ical.
typography (n.): 1640s, from French typographie, from Medieval Latin typographia, from Greek typos (see type (n.)) + -grapheia "writing," from graphein "to write" (see -graphy).
typology (n.): 1845, from Greek typos (see type) + -ology.
tyrannical (adj.): 1530s; see tyranny + -ical. Tyrannic was used in this sense from late 15c.
tyrannize (v.): late 15c., from Middle French tyranniser (14c.), from tyrannie (see tyranny). Related: Tyrannized; tyrannizing.
tyrannosaurus (n.): carnivorous Cretaceous bipedal dinosaur, 1905, Modern Latin genus name, coined by H.F. Osborn (published 1906 in "Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History" XXI, p.259) from Greek tyrannos "tyrant" (see tyrant) + -saurus. Abbreviated name T. rex attested by 1970 (apparently first as the band name).
tyrannous (adj.): late 15c., from Latin tyrannus (see tyrant) + -ous.
tyranny (n.): late 14c., "cruel or unjust use of power," from Old French tyrannie (13c.), from Late Latin tyrannia "tyranny," from Greek tyrannia "rule of a tyrant," from tyrannos "master" (see tyrant).
tyrant (n.): c.1300, "absolute ruler," from Old French tyrant (12c.), from Latin tyrannus "lord, master, tyrant" (cf. Spanish tirano, Italian tiranno), from Greek tyrannos "lord, master, sovereign, absolute ruler," a loan-word from a language of Asia Minor (probably Lydian); cf. Etruscan Turan "mistress, lady" (surname of Venus).
In the exact sense, a tyrant is an individual who arrogates to himself the royal authority without having a right to it. This is how the Greeks understood the word 'tyrant': they applied it indifferently to good and bad princes whose authority was not legitimate. [Rousseau, "The Social Contract"]
The spelling with -t arose in Old French by analogy with present participle endings in -ant. Fem. form tyranness is recorded from 1590 (Spenser); cf. Medieval Latin tyrannissa (late 14c.).
tyre (n.): variant spelling of tire (n.), chiefly British English.
Tyrian (adj.): 1510s, from Latin Tyrius "of Tyre," from Tyrus, island-city in the Levant, from Greek Tyros, from Hebrew/Phoenician tzor, literally "rock, rocky place." Especially in reference to Tyrian purple, a dye made there in ancient times from certain mollusks.
tyro (n.): 1610s, from Medieval Latin tyro, variant of Latin tiro (plural tirones) "young soldier, recruit, beginner," of unknown origin.
Tyrone: Irish county, from Irish Tir Eoghain "Eoghan's Land," from Eoghan "Owen," ancestor of the O'Neills, who owned land here. Tir also forms the final syllable in Leinster, Munster, Ulster.
tyrosine (n.): amino acid, 1857, coined 1846 by German chemist Baron von Justus Liebig (1802-1873), who had first obtained it a year before, from Greek tyros "cheese" + chemical suffix -ine (2). So called because it was easily obtained from old cheese.