Catena

The English word “chain” comes from the Latin word “catena”, which means “chain” (catena -> … -> chaene (Old French) -> … -> chain). The word “catena”¹ itself also survives in modern English, meaning “a chain or a connected series”².

One of the most common words having this origin is “concatenate”. I personally know this word in the context of programming. Anyway, this word is the combination of the prefix “con-“ and catena, the former meaning “with”, so concatenate means “to connect like the links of a chain”, and totally makes sense.

If you have ever studied mathematics, maybe you know what “catenary” is. This term obviously comes from the word catena and refers to the curve formed by a chain hanging freely from two fixed points.