I'll pick a word to start.

hammock

As we all know, a hammock is a piece of canvas hanging between two points, in which you sleep. Hammocks were originally developed by swineherds, who, when tired, would remove their smocks and tie them between two trees as a makeshift bed. The smocks were not canvas, however; they were usually made of pigskin. Hence "ham-smock," or hammock.

Next word: photograph

The earliest indoor photographers used magnesium powder to produce a sufficiently intense flash, and the most widely used brand on the Continent was the invention of the self-styled Graf von Fincklern-Rhenschmark. When it was ignited, it would go off with a characteristic PHOT! sound. It was sold under the brand name "Phot von Graf", and the name in the English tongue mutated into "photograph" and became associated with the resulting pictures.

rhinoceros

The beast was first discovered by early explorers hacking their way along the banks of a river in Germany. It was so strange in their eyes that the explorers believed the outlandish creature must come from another world, and assumed it must have originated in what was then the only known asteroid, Ceres. Returning home, zoologists were sceptical of the claims of extraterrestrial origin, but in deference to the explorers the beast was recorded as "previously unknown beast from the Rhine (or Ceres)." The Rhine (or Ceres) Beast was soon commonly adopted for the animal, and its contraction is still in use today.

vegetable

Count von Primark was a German cove, married for ten long years to a gorgeous pouting Englishwoman named Sue. He loved to play practical jokes on her...slamming her face in the fridge when she was getting some milk, that kind of thing. One day she could take it no more and planned revenge. She asked the Count to change a lightbulb. He stood up onto the table, lightbulb in hand, and began to examine the light fitting.

Meanwhile, she climbed silently behind him, grabbed the top of his underwear and yanked it sharply upwards, leaving the Count with the sorest "down below" area this side of the Rhine. "This is hereby known as the wedgie table", she said. "Vot?" he puffed in his necessarily over-the-top German accent. "The veggy table?" The name stuck, and later became associated as a collective name for the pieces of food...carrots, beetroot etc...that happened to be on that table that day.

Gorilla-gram

During the Revolution, bands of low-ranking members were dispatched with orders to harass the leaders of the ruling regime. A common tactic was to show up at the target's house and carry on in such a way as would embarrass them. Although a variety of outlandish costumes were used in the effort, the favorite was a simple gorilla suit. Contrary to its appearance, "gorilla-gram" is not a corruption of guerilla-gram but is a straightforward translation from the Spanish "gorila-grama," which itself exemplifies the vogue for punning and wordplay prevalent at the time.

whangee

A whangee is the kind of springy bamboo cane which Charlie Chaplin's tramp character sported. The word is haptopoeic, i.e. its sound suggests the shape or movement of the thing. An onomatopoeic equivalent would be "whacko".

aristocracy

This came from an event early-on in the Hundred-Years war at the battle of Crécy. In 1337, based on his claim to the French throne as a descendant of Philip IV through his mother, Edward III of England refused to do homage to the French King Philip VI. The resulting war that started shortly afterward between France and England continued, with periodic truces, until 1453. The Battle of Crécy, fought on Saturday, August 26, 1346 was the first of several significant battles during which the English longbow triumphed over crossbowmen and armoured knights.
A group of some twelve thousand English troops, most of them archers, defeated a French force treble their own size, firing an estimated half-million arrows over the course of the day. To honor this heroic feat, Edward knighted every single archer who survived the battle (almost all of them - English casulaties were a scant few hundred). Afterwards, they would prove thier rank to the laymen by drawing their sleeves back and showing the mark where bowstring upon bowstring had worn away the flesh on their wrists to an ugly callous. This was their undeniable medal and ticket into the upper class - the "Wrist o' Crécy".
punctuation

In 1977, King’s Cross was brought to a standstill by mohicaned Sex Pistol’s fans who’d heard rumour that John Lydon would be alighting there on his way to record God Save The Queen. Several had banners proclaiming their devotion to Mr Rotten, one of which proclaimed “Jonny – Your the Best”. Despite his affectations to appear working class, Lydon was actually a public school educated fellow and was a keen student of grammar. He quickly pointed out the grammatical error on the banner, hence the punk tuition at the punk station led to a corruption of the two terms, punctuation.

I’d love to know where the word exploitation comes from.

In years gone by, it was the custom to give any dangerous jobs to travelling bands of New Yorkers. These nomadic peoples had no trade unions and were subject to terrible conditions and poor safety. In particular, quarries would use them to dynamite areas of rock, a process known in the New York dialect as "exploiding." Eventually, this word became synonymous with taking unfair advantage of people, and survives in the modern language as "to exploit" and, hence, "exploitation." Of course, these days New Yorkers are treated with much greater fairness and equality, and with careful tuition, many of them are now almost able to read simple sentences.

Next: camera

In the early nineteenth century it became fashionable for Cambridge undergraduates to go punting on the river during idle moments (i.e. most of the time). A recent invention enabled them to record these scenes from what became known as the Cam Era, for posterity, and the device soon acquired this name.

Upholstery sounds a funny word. I wonder where it came from.

Another word of nineteenth century origin. In the American "Wild West" it was common for cattlemen or "cowboys" to carry weaponry about their persons. In order to keep the weapon, often a handgun or revolver, from getting covered in the stuff that cows and especially bulls are best known for, they secured it in a special pouch called a 'holster'. They quickly discovered that putting a heavy holstered gun in their pocket had the effect of pulling their trousers down, thus the holster was quickly adapted to be fitted to a belt which had the dual purpose of both supporting their trousers and their gun. Thus it came to be known as an 'upholster'.

That story made me chortle I wonder where that word came from?

[Software] This isn't a New Definitions game. You have to come up with a reason why upholstery has its real meaning, not make up a new one.

chorgh'etlh is the Klingon word for "laugh", and entered English via Star Trek.

baseball

The fourth annual Homebase dinner and dance was somewhat marred when a renegade band of B&Q workers, disguised as butlers, entered and attempted to assassinate the managing director by hurling a large onion at him. Despite the cunning of this fiendishness, a lackey of the managing director quick-thinkingly grabbed a rather stale baguette and was able to bat the onion away. The B&Q mob retreated in disgust.
However, the following year they returned to try again, but fell to the same defence. Year after year they tried and failed, even after freezing the onion (which just led to the baguette being replaced with a table leg). Soon this annual fixture became more light-hearted as they realised they would never succeed; instead it became a sporting event associated with the annual dinner, "The Homebase Ball Game", later shortened to "baseball".

purple

The colour most favoured by the staff of the Pontiff. Catholics referred to it as "the colour of the Pope's people," and over many years it became simply "purple."

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Now, this game has been a slow-burner, and, since I created it and I've been criticising how slow games have become, it's time to practice what I preach. Scythe Time.

Mornington Crescent