There is always a fly in the house. At least it is just one and not the first summer we moved here - in 2011 - when there were billions of flies in Niagara due to some pond disaster that gave rise to a Niagara infestation. There was a facebook page set up for them - it was called FlyVille. Its last entry was in 2014 - it took another few years for the population to dwindle from that first "swarming".
My question is why is that flies don't have their own name? They seemed to be named after what they do most - fly. Could it be that centuries ago people were both ignorant of them and so irritated by them that insects flying were just called "flies". Yes, that seems to be so.
"Old English fleoge "a fly, winged insect," from Proto-Germanic *fleugon "flying insect" (source also of Old Saxon fleiga, Old Norse fluga, Middle Dutch vlieghe, Dutch vlieg, Old High German flioga, German Fliege "fly"); literally "the flying (insect)" (compare Old English fleogende "flying"), from PIE root *pleu- "to flow," which is also the source of fly (v.1)."
"Originally any winged insect (moths, gnats, beetles, locusts, hence butterfly, etc.) and long used by farmers and gardeners for any insect parasite. Flies figuratively for "large numbers" of anything is from 1590s. Plural flien (as in oxen, etc.) gradually normalized 13c.-15c. to -s. Fly in the ointment is from Eccles. x:1. Fly on the wall "unseen observer" first recorded 1881. No flies on _____ "no lack of activity or alertness on the part of," is attested by 1866. Meaning "fish-hook dressed to resemble an insect" is from 1580s; Fly-fishing is from 1650s. Fly-catcher "bird which eats insects on the wing" is from 1670s. The fly agaric mushroom (1788) so called because it was used as a poison for flies."
Eventually scientists got onto naming and they became the order Diptera - "true flies" - now there's a distinctive name. They are distinguished by having only two wings.
An article headlined that there are 8.7 million species of livings things that still don't have names - I expect that's because we haven't "discovered" them yet.
Here's a test of identification - if that has 2 wings, could it be a "fly"?
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