When I have read "Big Fish", unlike many others, I wasn't entirely moved. But I did have to look this word up as it sounded familiar but I was not sure of its meaning any more.

The journey that followed isquite interesting. As it turned out the "exotic" word actually means something that is common enough and something that occurs every day.

A related word "quota" is not only often used in English but also quite common in Telugu representing a "an ongoing or frequent allocation". Most likely this association was borrowed from English to Telugu. Odd, a word I found so foreign, could easily have been deduced by my Grandfather that never spoke a word of English. Worlds apart yet connected.

The later part of "quotidian", namely "dian" or "dias", apparently comes from a Latin/Sanskrit root meaning "day".

To top it off the word "quo" or "kwo" or "ko" is a familiar word in Hindi indicating how. A similar word "quis" still exists in Hindi meaning "who".

So the first part of quotidian quot is related to "how many".

Even quote seem to have been derived from a "sequence of numbers".

I also wonder now what the origin of "Koti" (10 million in Telugu) is. It will be interesting to know if the origin of that word is Sanskrit.

I have just checked and apparently it is a sanskrit number representing those millions. Here is the link

SANSKRIT NUMBERS: Ordinals