Children whose parents have died, or things that have been abandoned or left without support.
From Greek orphanos meaning 'bereaved, deprived'. The word entered English through Latin orphanus and Old French orphelin. The extended sense of 'abandoned things' developed from the core meaning of being left without care or support.
In typography, 'orphan' describes a single line of text stranded at the bottom of a page, while its companion 'widow' describes a line stranded at the top - printing terminology borrowed the language of loss to describe these lonely, isolated elements. This shows how human experiences shape even technical vocabulary.
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