Laborare torquere ipsum est
I could guess that people used to consider work as a torture thanks to … word etymology!
In fact, in the Middle Age, there used to be a torture instrument called “tripalium“, which consists of attaching the hands and feet of the condemned to 4 horses in order to quarter him.
Very cruel! but what does this have to do with working? The French “travailler“, as well as the Spanish “trabajar” and the Portuguese “trabalhar” are from “tripaliare“, popular Latin that means “to torture with tripalium”; thus, to work tripaliare ipsum est (is to torture oneself)!
In latin, laborare (to work) also means “to suffer”, quod erat demonstrandum.
I also noticed that in Russian, to work is работать [rabotat’]; however, the substantive раб[rab] means “slave”! Playing at the chicken or the egg, there’s no doubt that the verb has been taken from the substantive.
