Vocabulary note: forum, "the marketplace" or "the center of public life in a city or town" has come to mean any
public meeting place or medium for open discussion. The root of forum is FOR- meaning "door"; other words
from this root are: forest, foreign, foreclose, forfeit, and hors d'oeuvre (outside the chef's work). From forum
comes forensic, "pertaining to the lawcourts." For- is cognate to English door.
Vocabulary note: focus means "hearth" in Latin, as in the expression pro aris et focis, "for altars and hearths."
The English words focus and focal take their meaning from the centrality of the fireplace in the home. In the
Romance languages (the languages derived from the language of the Romans), the fire itself is still burning: feu
(French), fuego (Spanish), fuoco (Italian). Thus the English words curfew, fuel, foyer come from Latin through
French.
