BIP39 stands for Bitcoin Enhancement Proposal 39. The words are picked from a particular list of 2048 common English words which may be used to the generate a binary seed (your personal vital). Standard recovery phrases use a certain list of 2048 words pursuing the BIP39 standard (Bitcoin Advancement Proposal https://dailybookmarkhit.com/story18866918/the-definitive-guide-to-bip39-seed-phrase