Weightiness and Nonchalance, the Unexpected Connection

Doris at Grans on Bran posts about a BBC look at the word, tingo. The comments that ensue deal with odd words in the English language.

One of the oddest English words is nonchalant. If non is a negative prefix in this world, as it is in others, then to be nonchalant is to exhibit behaviors that are the opposite of those seen in people who are chalant. But whoever heard of a person being described in that way, except maybe in fun?

The word chalant isn't in the English dictionary. Anyone described as such would presumably be extemely nervous and high-strung.

But, I've learned that, as I suspected, the word comes from the French. Dictionary.com says in explaining the derivation of nonchalant:

"[French, from Old French, present participle of nonchaloir, to be unconcerned : non-, non- + chaloir, to cause concern to (from Latin calre, to be warm, heat up. See kel-1 in Indo-European Roots).]"

So, it would seem that being chalant, if ever one were struck by this condition, would have something to do with kel, the Latin prefix from which the word, calories is derived.

And here I thought that the French didn't worry about getting fat!