test [LME] During medieval times a test was another name for what is now called a cupel, a shallow, porous container in which gold or silver can be refined or tested. The word goes back to Latin testu or testum ‘earthen pot’. The original function of the container lies behind phrases like put to the test and stand the test [both E17th]. See also acid. The first cricket matches to be called Test matches seem to have been those played between Australia and the touring English team in 1861–62. The term probably arose from the idea that the matches were a test of strength between the sides. If someone reproaches an irritable friend for being testy [LME] they are using a word which first meant ‘headstrong, impetuous’ and goes back to Old French teste ‘head’. The words are linked by the fact that teste (modern French tête) goes back to testum. In popular Latin ‘pot’ was used as a slang term for head in the way we might employ ‘use your loaf’ today. Tetchy [L16th] has the same meaning but is unrelated—it is probably a variant of the old Scots word tache ‘blotch, fault’, from French.