Misnomer

Examples

Older name retained

• The "lead" in pencils is made of graphite and clay, not lead; graphite was originally believed to be lead ore, but this is now known not to be the case. The graphite and clay mix is known as plumbago, meaning "lead ore" in Latin.
• Blackboards can be black, green, red, blue, or brown. And the sticks of chalk are no longer made of chalk, but of gypsum.
• Tin foil is almost always aluminium, whereas "tin cans" made for the storage of food products are made from steel with a thin tin plating. In both cases, tin was the original metal.
• Telephone numbers are usually referred to as being "dialed" although rotary phones are now rare.
• In golf, the clubs commonly referred to as woods are usually made of metal. The club heads for "woods" were formerly made predominantly of wood.

Similarity of appearance

• Catgut is made from sheep intestines.
• Head cheese is a meat product.
• A horned toad is a lizard.
• A velvet ant is a wasp.

  Difference between common and technical meanings

• Koala "bears" are marsupials not closely related to the bear family, Ursidae. The name "koala" is preferred in Australia, where koalas are native, but the term "koala bear" is still in use today outside of Australia.
• Jellyfish and starfish are not even closely related to fish.
• A peanut is not a nut in the botanical sense, but rather a legume. Similarly, a coconut is not a botanical nut but a drupe.
• Several fruit that are not berries include strawberries, bayberries, raspberries, and blackberries.

  Association with place other than that which one may assume

• The guinea pig originated in the Andes not Guinea, and additionally is a rodent and unrelated to pigs.
• French horns originated in Germany, not France.
• Chinese checkers did not originate in China, nor in any part of Asia.

  Other

• Although dry cleaning does not involve water, it does involve the use of liquid solvents.
• The "funny bone" is not a bone—the phrase refers to the ulnar nerve.
• A quantum leap is properly an "instantaneous change" that may be either large or small. In physics it is a change of an electron from one energy level to another within an atom. In common usage, however, the term is often taken to mean a large, abrupt change.
• "Tennis elbow" does not necessarily result from playing tennis.