We'll send you weekly previews of the Latest Edition , plus notification of other changes to the site. Thank you, Sunf. I was stuck for a Spotlight and this will do splendidly. The Latin word hospes has given rise to a whole family of related words. In Old French, hospitale was simplified to hostel , which entered Middle English as both hostel and ostel and became the Modern French h tel , entering English as hotel in the early 18th century.
Etymologists call such words doublets.
Note that the French h tel has a diacritical mark called a circumflex on the o . This frequently occurs before a t and signifies an s which has been lost from the Old French. Shortening has nothing to do with short as most of us know it. Instead, there's another word short which describes something which is easily crumbled or brittle. By the way, shortening was first recorded in about 1823.