Salmon is a type of fish that lives in the ocean but swims back up rivers to lay its eggs. Its pink or orange flesh is widely eaten as food.
From Old French *saumon*, from Latin *salmo, salmonis*, meaning 'salmon'. The *l* sound in spelling stopped being pronounced in English, but the letter stayed.
Salmon are famous for swimming upstream, and the word does a bit of that too—its silent 'l' looks like it should be said but isn’t. Many English words kept their old spellings even after pronunciation changed, like fossils on the page. Reading salmon is like seeing the ghost of Latin swim through English.
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