In a Word: The Vanguard Doesn’t Guard Vans

Senior managing editor and logophile Andy Hollandbeck reveals the sometimes surprising roots of common English words and phrases. Remember: Etymology tells us where a word comes from, but not what it means today.

War has led a nearly continuous existence throughout the history of humanity. Though strategies and tactics have changed over time, one thing has remained constant: The people who charge in first risk taking more damage than those who come after, whether we’re talking ships, tanks, or individual people. But as battle technology has progressed, armies and navies have found ways to improve the odds for those at the front.

During the Middle Ages, that meant that the soldiers (or, on the sea, the ships) at the front of the charge were given more or better armor or a larger stock or wider array of weaponry. In Old French, these “front-runners” were called avant-garde — avant (from the Latin abante) meaning “in front” and garde meaning, well, guard “soldier, protector, preserver.”

In one variant of 15th-century Anglo-French, avant-garde became vaunt-garde — perhaps on the mistaken assumption that the initial a was the indefinite article — which eventually became the Modern English word vanguard. That word still means “the forefront of a movement,” both literally and figuratively.

Of course, that wasn’t the last English saw of avant-garde. The English-speaking world of art and culture would borrow this French expression once again in the early 20th century, but in a non-military sense. That avant-garde is the group of people developing new or experimental concepts in an artistic discipline.

As for vans, they have nothing to do with vanguards, being notoriously poor performers in battle (especially in naval warfare). The word van appeared in the early to mid-1800s as simply another name for a covered wagon. It was a shortening of caravan, possibly on the misapprehension that a caravan was actually a carry-van. In the 20th century, the word was reused to describe large, boxy cargo vehicles, on which the vanguard of tackiness would airbrush colorful artwork.

Caravan has long been an indication of an entire company of travelers heading to the same place. The word was picked up and anglicized during the Crusades, from the Arabic qairawan, which has been traced back to the Sanskirt karabhah “camel.”