Vol. 09 · Loanwords ·South Asia ·1830s
Juggernaut
from Jagannātha (Sanskrit — "lord of the universe")
- Meaning
- A title of Vishnu, especially at the Jagannath temple in Puri.
- Source word
- Jagannātha (Sanskrit — "lord of the universe")
- Route into English
- British reports of the Puri chariot festival — where enormous wooden chariots are pulled by crowds — generated the metaphor "unstoppable force." The religious origin is now obscure.
- Arrived
- 1830s
From South Asia
Three centuries of British colonial contact — East India Company, Raj, military, domestic life — deposited a distinct Hindi/Urdu/Bengali/Sanskrit layer in everyday English.
English borrows.
Browse the full loanword atlas or explore another source language.