"a split, crack," 1530s, with unetymological -k + Middle English chine (and replacing this word) "fissure, narrow valley," from Old English cinu, cine "fissure," which is related to cinan "to crack, split, gape," from Proto-Germanic *kino-(source also of Old Saxon and Old High German kinan, Gothic uskeinan, German keimen "to germinate;" Middle Dutch kene, Old Saxon kin, German Keim "germ"). The connection being in the notion of bursting open.
"hell," 1620s (earlier "a place of torture," 1590s), from Church Latin gehenna (Tertullian), from Greek geenna, from post-biblical Hebrew gehinnom "Hell, place of fiery torment for the dead," figurative use of the place name Ge Hinnom "the Valley of Hinnom," southwest of Jerusalem, where, according to Jeremiah xix.5, children were sacrificed to Moloch. Middle English had gehenne (late 15c.) from French gehenne.
"narrow valley between cliffs," 1834, from Mexican Spanish cañon, extended sense of Spanish cañon "a pipe, tube; deep hollow, gorge," augmentative of cano "a tube," from Latin canna "reed" (see cane (n.)). But earlier spelling callon (1560s) might suggest a source in calle "street."
This use of the word cañon is peculiar to the United States, it being rare in Mexico, and not at all known in Spain or in Spanish South America. [Century Dictionary]
ball game of eastern origin resembling field hockey played on horseback, 1872, Anglo-Indian polo, from Balti (Tibetan language of the Indus valley) polo "ball," related to Tibetan pulu "ball." An ancient game in south Asia, first played in England at Aldershot, 1871. Water polo is from 1876 (in early versions players sometimes paddled about on barrels or in canoes). Polo shirt (1892) originally was a kind worn by polo players.
1580s, "pertaining to Nemea," a wooded valley in the northern Argolis, from Greek nemos "grove, forest," from PIE *nemos (source also of Latin nemus "forest, (holy) wood" and the Celtic word for "(holy) wood, sanctuary" preserved in Gaulish nemeton, Old Irish nemed). Especially in reference to the lion there, which was said to have been killed by Herakles as one of his 12 labors. The Nemean Games were one of the four great national festivals of the ancient Greeks. The victor's garland was made of parsley.
