Where did the word "Ale" originate from?!
Answers: and what are some other names for something similar to this and how are they different from each other?
Well the etymology was provided by a previous poster so as for substitutes for the word "ale" I really can't think of any in English at any rate. Ale is a very specific designation of beer. Within beer the counterpart to ale is lager. Lager comes from the German word for storage since a large part of the process involved with making lager is a lengthy cold storage.
The difference between ale and lager...
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;...
EDIT:
OK... The difference between ale and lager (both are beer) is the yeast, that's basically it both are very diverse otherwise. The link I provided tells you that if you read my answer. In terms of ingredients both traditionally use barley malt, hops, yeast, and water. There are literally hundreds of varieties of each, yes even different water types. That's really irrelevant though, some beer uses corn, rice, wheat, sorghum, millet, fruit, honey, grape juice, spices, roots, herbs, bacteria.... the list goes on for days.
The actual brewing process is the same unless you want to get overly technical and start discussing the benefits of decoction mashing to the malt profile.
Ale = warm top fermenting yeast (saccharomyces cerevisiae)
Lager = colder bottom fermenting yeast (saccharomyces uvarum)
Middle English, from Old English ealu; akin to Old Norse ale, Lithuanian alus
It's from old Norse ?l I believe
The word 'ale' comes from the Old English ealu, in turn from the Proto-Indo-European base *alut-, which holds connotations of "sorcery, magic, possession, intoxication".[citation needed]
Ancient English, alu or alut.
ale : pronounced a-lay...nigerian yoruba.means extra marital affairs.boy lover or girl lover outside marriage.