A really strange etymology
My roommate pointed out that the ubiquitous farewell "ciao" (known to Brazilians, for instance, as "tchau") actually means "slave".
Wikipedia agrees that the word comes from an abbreviation of a phrase akin to Italian "sono vostro schiavo" ("I am your slave"). This sounds less bizarre in the context of ancient letter closings like "I beg to remain / your most humble and obedient servant", but it's still pretty weird to modern ears.
"Schiavo" is still the modern Italian term for "slave" (that's what Terri Schiavo's last name means, as far as I can tell); compare Portuguese "escravo" and Spanish "esclavo". (I think that the name of the city and river Escravos in Nigeria is a reference to the Portuguese Atlantic slave trade. Nigeria lay along what was formerly known as the "Slave Coast", akin to the Gold Coast and Ivory Coast. The Slave Coast is no longer so called, yet Nigeria still has a city whose name means Slaves.)
The other bizarre thing is that, if we believe Wikipedia, all of these words -- "Escravos" as well as "ciao" as well as the English word "slave" -- actually derive from the name of the Slavs because of their propensity to be enslaved as prisoners of war in classical antiquity.
