FOOTNOTES

Transformation of Words

It is not very uncommon for a word, while it is derived from one word, to receive a certain impulse and modification from another. This extends sometimes beyond the spelling, and in cases where it does so, would hardly belong to our present theme. Still I may notice an instance or two. Thus our ‘obsequies’ is the Latin ‘exequiæ’, but formed under a certain impulse of ‘obsequium’, and seeking to express and include the observant honour of that word. ‘To refuse’ is ‘recusare’, while yet it has derived the ‘f’ of its second syllable from ‘refutare’; it is a medley of the two[265]. The French ‘rame’, an oar, is ‘remus’, but that modified by an unconscious recollection of ‘ramus’. ‘Orange’ is no doubt a Persian word, which has reached us through the Arabic, and which the Spanish ‘naranja’ more nearly represents than any form of it existing in the other languages of Europe. But what so natural as to think of the orange as thegoldenfruit, especially when the “aureamala” of the Hesperides were familiar to all antiquity? There cannot be a doubt that ‘aurum’, ‘oro’, ‘or’, made themselves felt in the shapes which the word assumed in the languages of the West, and that here we have the explanation of the change in the first syllable, as in the low Latin ‘aurantium’, ‘orangia’, and in the French ‘orange’, which has given us our own.

It is foreign words, or words adopted from foreign languages, as might beforehand be expected, which are especially subjected to such transformations as these. The soul which the word once had in its own language, having, for as many as do not know that language, departed from it, or at least not being now any more to be recognized by such as employ the word, these are not satisfied till they have put another soul into it, and it has thus become alive to them again. Thus—to take first one or two very familiar instances, but which serve as well as any other to illustrate my position—the Bellerophon becomes for our sailors the ‘Billy Ruffian’, for what can they know of the Greek mythology, or of the slayer of Chimæra? an iron steamer, the Hirondelle, now or lately plying on the Tyne, is the ‘Iron Devil’. ‘Contredanse’, or dance in which the parties standface to facewith one another, and which ought to have appeared in English as ‘counterdance’, does become ‘countrydance’[266], as though it were the dance of the country folk and ruraldistricts, as distinguished from the quadrille and waltz and more artificial dances of the town[267]. A well known rose, the “rosedes quatre saisons”, or of the four seasons, becomes on the lips of some of our gardeners, the “rose of thequarter sessions”, though here it is probable that the eye has misled, rather than the ear. ‘Dent de lion’, (it is spelt ‘dentdelyon’ in our early writers) becomes ‘dandylion’, “chaudemelée”, or an affray inhotblood, “chance-medley”[268], ‘causey’ (chaussée) becomes ‘causeway’[269], ‘rachitis’ ‘rickets’[270], and in French ‘mandragora’ ‘main de gloire’[271].

‘Necromancy’

‘Necromancy’ is another word which, if not now, yet for a long period was erroneously spelt, and indeed assumed a different shape, under the influence of an erroneous derivation; which, curiously enough, even now that it has been dismissed, has left behind it the marks of its presence, in our common phrase, “theBlackArt”. I need hardly remind you that ‘necromancy’ is a Greek word, which signifies, according to its proper meaning, a prophesying by aid of the dead,or that it rests on the presumed power of raising up by potent spells the dead, and compelling them to give answers about things to come. We all know that it was supposed possible to exercise such power; we have a very awful example of it in the story of the witch of Endor, and a veryhorridone in Lucan[272]. But the Latin medieval writers, whose Greek was either little or none, spelt the word, ‘nigromantia’, as if its first syllables had been Latin: at the same time, not wholly forgetting the original meaning, but in fact getting round to it though by a wrong process, they understood the dead by these ‘nigri’, or blacks, whom they had brought into the word[273]. Down to a rather late period we find the forms, ‘negromancer’ and ‘negromancy’ frequent in English.

Words Misspelt

‘Pleurisy’ used often to be spelt, (I do not think it is so now,) without an ‘e’ in the first syllable, evidently on the tacit assumption that it was fromplus pluris[274]. When Shakespeare falls into an error, he “makes the offence gracious”; yet, I think, he would scarcely have written,

“For goodness growing to aplurisyDies of his owntoo much”,

but thathetoo derived ‘plurisy’ frompluris. This, even with the “small Latin and less Greek”, which Ben Jonson allows him, he scarcely would have done, had the word presented itself in thatform, which by right of its descent fromπλευρά(being a pain, stitch, or sicknessin the side) it ought to have possessed. Those who for ‘crucible’ wrote ‘chrysoble’ (Jeremy Taylor does so) must evidently have done this under the assumption that the Greek forgold, and not the Latin forcross, lay at the foundation of this word. ‘Anthymn’ instead of ‘anthem’ (Barrow so spells the word), rests plainly on a wrong etymology, even as this spelling clearly betrays what that wrong etymology is. ‘Rhyme’ with a ‘y’ is a modern misspelling; and would never have been but for the undue influence which the Greek ‘rhythm’ has exercised upon it. Spenser and his cotemporaries spell it ‘rime’. ‘Abominable’ was by some etymologists of the seventeenth century spelt ‘abhominable’, as though it were that which departed from the human (ab homine) into the bestial or devilish.

In all these words which I have adduced last, the correct spelling has in the end resumed its sway. It is not so with ‘frontispiece’, which ought to be spelt ‘frontispice’ (it was so by Milton and others), being the low Latin ‘frontispicium’, from ‘frons’ and ‘aspicio’, the forefront of the building, that part which presents itself to the view. It was only the entirely ungrounded notion that the word ‘piece’ constitutes the last syllable, which has given rise to our present orthography[275].

Wrong Spelling

You may, perhaps, wonder that I have dwelt so long on these details of spelling; that I havebestowed on them so much of my own attention, that I have claimed for them so much of yours; yet in truth I cannot regard them as unworthy of our very closest heed. For indeed of how much beyond itself is accurate or inaccurate spelling the certain indication. Thus when we meet ‘syren’, for ‘siren’, as so strangely often we do, almost always in newspapers, and often where we should hardly have expected (I met it lately in theQuarterly Review, and again in Gifford’sMassinger), how difficult it is not to be “judges of evil thoughts”, and to take this slovenly misspelling as the specimen and evidence of an inaccuracy and ignorance which reaches very far wider than the single word which is before us. But why is it that so much significance is ascribed to a wrong spelling? Because ignorance of a word’s spelling at once argues ignorance of its origin and derivation. I do not mean that one who spells rightly may not be ignorant of it too, but he who spells wrongly is certainly so. Thus, to recur to the example I have just adduced, he who for ‘siren’ writes ‘syren’, certainly knows nothing of the magiccords(σειραί) of song, by which those fair enchantresses were supposed to draw those that heard them to their ruin[276].

Correct or incorrect orthography being, then, this note of accurate or inaccurate knowledge, we may confidently conclude where two spellingsof a word exist, and are both employed by persons who generally write with precision and scholarship, that there must be something to account for this. It will generally be worth your while to inquire into the causes which enable both spellings to hold their ground and to find their supporters, not ascribing either one or the other to mere carelessness or error. It will in these cases often be found that two spellings exist, because two views of the word’s origin exist, and each of those spellings is the correct expression of one of these. The question therefore which way of spelling should continue, and wholly supersede the other, and which, while the alternative remains, we should ourselves employ, can only be settled by settling which of these etymologies deserves the preference. So is it, for example, with ‘chymist’ and ‘chemist’, neither of which has obtained in our common use the complete mastery over the other[277]. It is not here, as in some other cases, that one is certainly right, the other as certainly wrong: but they severally represent two different etymologies of the word, and each is correct according to its own. If we are to spell ‘chymist’ and ‘chymistry’, it is because these words are considered to be derived from the Greek word,χυμός, sap; and the chymic art will then have occupied itself first with distilling the juice and sap of plants, and will from this have derived its name. I have little doubt, however, that the other spelling, ‘chemist’, not ‘chymist’, is the correct one. It was not with the distillation ofherbs, but with the amalgamation of metals, that chemistry occupied itself at its rise, and the word embodies a reference to Egypt, the land of Ham or ‘Cham’[278], in which this art was first practised with success.

‘Satyr’, ‘Satire’

Of how much confusion the spelling which used to be so common, ‘satyr’ for ‘satire’, is at once the consequence, the expression, and again the cause; not indeed that this confusion first began with us[279]; for the same already found place in the Latin, where ‘satyricus’ was continually written for ‘satiricus’ out of a false assumption of the identity between the Romansatireand the Greeksatyricdrama. The Roman ‘satira’,—I speak of things familiar to many of my hearers,—is properly afulldish (lanx being understood)—a dish heaped up with various ingredients, a ‘farce’ (according to the original signification of that word), or hodge-podge; and the word was transferred from this to a form of poetry which at first admitted the utmost variety in the materials of which it was composed, and the shapes into which these materials were wrought up; being the only form of poetry which the Romans didnotborrow from the Greeks. Wholly different from this, having no one point of contact with it in its form, its history, or its intention, is the ‘satyric’ drama of Greece, so called because Silenus and the ‘Satyrs’ supplied the chorus; and in their naïve selfishness, and mere animal instincts, held up before men a mirror of what they would be, if only the divine, which is also the truly human, element of humanity, were withdrawn; what man, all that properly made him man being withdrawn, would prove.

‘Mid-wife’, ‘Nostril’

And then what light, as we have already seen, does the older spelling of a word often cast upon its etymology; how often does it clear up the mystery, which would otherwise have hung about it, or whichhadhung about it till some one had noticed and turned to profit this its earlier spelling. Thus ‘dirge’ is always spelt ‘dirige’ in early English. This ‘dirige’ may be the first word in a Latin psalm or prayer once used at funerals; there is a reasonable probability that the explanation of the word is here; at any rate, if it is not here, it is nowhere[280]. The derivation of ‘mid-wife’ is uncertain, and has been the subject of discussion; but when we find it spelt ‘medewife’ and ‘meadwife’, in Wiclif’s Bible, this leaves hardly a doubt that it is thewifeor woman whoacts for ameador reward[281]. In cases too where there was no mystery hanging about a word, how often does the early spelling make clear to all that which was before only known to those who had made the language their study. For example, if an early edition of Spenser should come into your hands, or a modern one in which the early spelling is retained, what continual lessons in English might you derive from it. Thus ‘nostril’ is always spelt by him and his cotemporaries ‘nosethrill’; a little earlier it was ‘nosethirle’. Now ‘to thrill’ is the same as to drill or pierce; it is plain then here at once that the word signifies the orifice or opening with which thenoseisthrilled, drilled, or pierced. We might have read the word for ever in our modern spelling without being taught this. ‘Ell’ tells us nothing about itself; but in ‘eln’ used in Holland’s translation of Camden, we recognize ‘ulna’ at once.

Again, the ‘morris’ or ‘morrice-dance’, which is alluded to so often by our early poets, as it is now spelt informs us nothing about itself; but read ‘moriskedance’, as it is generally spelt by Holland and his cotemporaries, and you will scarcely fail to perceive that of which indeed there is no manner of doubt; namely, that it was so called either because it was really, or was supposed to be, a dance in use among themoriscoesof Spain, and from thence introduced into England[282].

Again, philologers tell us, and no doubt rightly, that our ‘cray-fish’, or ‘craw-fish’, is the French ‘écrevisse’. This is true, but certainly it is not self-evident. Trace however the word through these successive spellings, ‘krevys’ (Lydgate), ‘crevish’ (Gascoigne), ‘craifish’ (Holland), and the chasm between ‘cray-fish’ or ‘craw-fish’ and ‘écrevisse’ is by aid of these three intermediate spellings bridged over at once; and in the fact of our Gothic ‘fish’ finding its way into this French word we see only another example of a law, which has been already abundantly illustrated in this lecture[283].

‘Emmet’, ‘Ant’

In other ways also an accurate taking note of the spelling of words, and of the successive changes which it has undergone, will often throw light upon them. Thus we may know, others having assured us of the fact, that ‘ant’ and ‘emmet’ were originally only two different spellings of one and the same word; but we may be perplexed to understand how two forms of a word, now so different, could ever have diverged from a single root. When however we find the different spellings, ‘emmet’, ‘emet’, ‘amet’, ‘amt’, ‘ant’, the gulf which appeared to separate ‘emmet’ from ‘ant’ is bridged over at once, and we do not merely know on the assurance of others that these two are in fact identical, their differences being only superficial, but we perceive clearly in what manner they are so[284].

Even before any close examination of the matter, it is hard not to suspect that ‘runagate’ is in fact another form of ‘renegade’, slightly transformed, as so many words, to put an English signification into its first syllable; and then the meaning gradually modified in obedience to the new derivation which was assumed to be its original and true one. Our suspicion of this is very greatly strengthened (for we see how very closely the words approach one another), by the fact that ‘renegade’ is constantly spelt ‘renegate’ in our old authors, while at the same time the denial offaith, which is now a necessary element in ‘renegade’, and one differencing it inwardly from ‘runagate’, is altogether wanting in early use—the denial ofcountryand of the duties thereto owing being all that is implied in it. Thus it is constantly employed in Holland’sLivyas a rendering of ‘perfuga’[285]; while in the one passage where ‘runagate’ occurs in the Prayer Book Version of the Psalms (Ps. lxviii. 6), a reference to the original will show that the translators could only have employed it there on the ground that it also expressed rebel, revolter, and not runaway merely[286].

Assimilating Power of English

I might easily occupy your attention much longer, so little barren or unfruitful does this subject of spelling appear likely to prove; but all things must have an end; and as I concluded my first lecture with a remarkable testimonyborne by an illustrious German scholar to the merits of our English tongue, I will conclude my last with the words of another, not indeed a German, but still of the great Germanic stock; words resuming in themselves much of which we have been speaking upon this and upon former occasions: “As our bodies”, he says, “have hidden resources and expedients, to remove the obstacles which the very art of the physician puts in its way, so language, ruled by an indomitable inward principle, triumphs in some degree over the folly of grammarians. Look at the English, polluted by Danish and Norman conquests, distorted in its genuine and noble features by old and recent endeavours to mould it after the French fashion, invaded by a hostile entrance of Greek and Latin words, threatening by increasing hosts to overwhelm the indigenous terms. In these long contests against the combined power of so many forcible enemies, the language, it is true, has lost some of its power of inversion in the structure of sentences, the means of denoting the difference of gender, and the nice distinctions by inflection and termination—almost every word is attacked by the spasm of the accent and the drawing of consonants to wrong positions; yet the old English principle is not overpowered. Trampled down by the ignoble feet of strangers, its springs still retain force enough to restore itself. It lives and plays through all the veins of the language; it impregnates the innumerable strangers entering its dominions with its temper, and stains them with its colour, not unlike the Greek which in taking up oriental words, strippedthem of their foreign costume, and bid them to appear as native Greeks”[287].

[228]In proof that it need not be so, I would only refer to a paper,On Orthographical Expedients, by Edwin Guest, Esq., in theTransactions of the Philological Society, vol. iii. p. 1.

[229][The scientific treatises on Phonetics of Mr. Alexander J. Ellis and Dr. Henry Sweet have surmounted the difficulty of registering sounds with great accuracy.]

[230]I have not observed this noticed in our dictionaries as the original form of the phrase. There is no doubt however of the fact; seeStanihurst’s Ireland, p. 33, in Holinshed’sChronicles. [Rather fromtorvien, to throw,—Skeat].

[231]Notes and Queries, No. 147.

[232]See Boswell’sLife of Johnson, Croker’s edit. 1848, p. 233.

[233][Thebwas purposely foisted into these words by bookmen to suggest their Latin derivation; it did not belong to them in earlier English. The same may be said of theg, intruded into ‘deign’ and ‘feign’.]

[234]A chief phonographer writes to me to deny that this is the present spelling (1856) of ‘Europe’. It was so when this paragraph was written. [Most people would now consider [Yeuroap] as American pronunciation.]

[235]Quintilian has expressed himself with the true dignity of a scholar on this matter (Inst.1, 6, 45): Consuetudinem sermonis vocaboconsensum eruditorum; sicut vivendi consensum bonorum.—How different from innovations like this the changes in the spelling of German which J. Grimm, so far as his own example may reach,hasintroduced; and the still bolder and more extensive ones which in thePrefaceto hisDeutsches Wörterbuch, pp. liv.-lxii., he avows his desire to see introduced;—as the employment off, not merely where it is at present used, but also wherevervis now employed; the substituting of thev, which would be thus disengaged, forw, and the entire dismissal ofw. They may be advisable, or they may not; it is not for strangers to offer an opinion; but at any rate they are not a seizing of the fluctuating, superficial accidents of the present, and a seeking to give permanent authority to these, but they all rest on a deep historic study of the language, and of the true genius of the language.

[236]Croker’s edit. 1848, pp.57, 61, 233.

[237][An incorrect conclusion. Almost all ‘ea’ words were pronounced ‘ai’ down to the eighteenth century. Thus ‘great’ was a true rhyme to ‘cheat’ and ‘complete’, their ordinary pronunciation being ‘grait’, ‘chait’, ‘complait’.]

[238][i.e. ‘Lunnun’.]

[239]A proposal for correcting, improving and ascertaining the English Tongue, 1711, Works, vol. ix, pp. 139-59.

[240][‘Devest’ was still in use till the end of the eighteenth century, but ‘divest’ is already found inKing Lear, 1605, i, 1, 50.]

[241]Pygmæi, quasicubitales(Augustine).

[242]First so used by Theophrastus in Greek, and by Pliny in Latin.—The real identity of the two words explains Milton’s use of ‘diamond’ inParadise Lost, b. 7; and also in that sublime passage in hisApology for Smectymnuus: “Then zeal, whose substance is ethereal, arming in completediamond”.—Diez (Wörterbuch d. Roman. Sprachen, p. 123) supposes, not very probably, that it was under a certain influence of ‘diafano’, the translucent, that ‘adamante’ was in the Italian, whence we have derived the word, changed into ‘diamante’.

[243][Similarlyjowlforchowlorchavel.]

[244]Richard III, Act iv, Sc. 4.

[245][For another account of this word, approved by Dr. Murray, seeThe Folk and their Word-Lore, p. 156.]

[246][‘Bliss’ representing the old Englishblithsorblidhs, blitheness, is really a quite distinct word from ‘bless’, standing forblets, old Englishblétsian(=blóedsian, to consecrate with blood,blód), although the latter was by a folk-etymology very frequently spelt ‘bliss’.]

[247][But ‘afraied’ is the earliest form of the word (1350), the verb itself being at first spelt ‘afray’ (1325). N.E.D.]

[248]How close this relationship was once, not merely in respect of etymology, but also of significance, a passage like this will prove: “Perchance, as vultures are said to smell the earthiness of a dying corpse; so this bird of prey [the evil spirit which personated Samuel, 1 Sam. xxviii. 41]resenteda worse than earthly savor in the soul of Saul, as evidence of his death at hand”. (Fuller,The Profane State, b. 5, c. 4.)

[249][There is an unfortunate confusion here between ‘heal’ to make ‘hale’ or ‘[w]hole’ (Anglo-Saxonhælan) and the old (and Provincial) Englishhill, to cover,hilling, covering,hellier, a slater, akin to ‘hell’, the covered place, ‘helm’; Icelandichylja, to cover.]

[250][By a curious slip Dr. Trench here confounds ‘recover’, to recuperate or regain health (derived through old Frenchrecovrerfrom Latinrecuperare), with a totally distinct wordre-cover, to cover or clothe over again, which comes from old Frenchcovrir, Latinco-operire. It is just the difference between ‘recovering’ a lost umbrella through the police and ‘recovering’ a torn one at a shop. I pointed this out to the author in 1869, and I think he altered the passage in his later editions.]

[251][‘Island’, though cognate with Anglo-Saxoneá-land“water-land” (Germanei-land), is really identical with Anglo-Saxoníg-land, i.e. “isle-land”, fromíg, an island, the diminutive of which survives ineyotorait.]

[252][The editor essayed to make a complete collection of this class of words in hisFolk-etymology, a Dictionary of Words corrupted by False Derivation or Mistaken Analogy, 1882, and more recently in a condensed form inThe Folk and their Word-Lore, 1904.]

[253]Diez looks with much favour on this process, and calls it, ein sinnreiches mittel fremdlinge ganz heimisch zu machen.

[254]Ammianus Marcellinus, xxii, 15, 28.

[255][The Greekpyramisprobably represents the Egyptianpiri-m-ûisi(Maspero,Dawn of Civilization, 358), orpir-am-us(Brugsch,Egypt under the Pharaohs, i, 73), rather thanpi-ram, ‘the height’ (Birch,Bunsen’s Egypt, v, 763).]

[256]Tacitus,Hist.v. 2.

[257]Let me illustrate this by further instances in a note. Thusβούτυρον, from which, through the Latin, our ‘butter’ has descended to us, is borrowed (Pliny,H.N.xxviii. 9) from a Scythian word, now to us unknown: yet it is sufficiently plain that the Greeks so shaped and spelt it as to contain apparent allusion tocowandcheese; there is inβούτυρονan evident feeling afterβοῦςandτυρόν. Bozra, meaning citadel in Hebrew and Phœnician, and the name, no doubt, which the citadel of Carthage bore, becomesΒύρσαon Greek lips; and then the well known legend of the ox-hide was invented upon the name; not having suggested it, but being itself suggested by it. Herodian (v. 6) reproduces the name of the Syrian goddess Astarte in a shape that is significant also for Greek ears—Ἀστροάρχη, The Star-ruler, or Star-queen. When the apostate and hellenizing Jews assumed Greek names, ‘Eliakim’ or “Whom God has set”, became ‘Alcimus’ (ἄλκιμος) or The Strong (1 Macc. vii. 5). Latin examples in like kind are ‘comissatio’, spelt continually ‘comessatio’, and ‘comessation’ by those who sought to naturalize it in England, as though it were connected with ‘cŏmedo’, to eat, being indeed the substantive from the verb ‘cōmissari’ (—κωμάζειν), to revel, as Plutarch, whose Latin is in general not very accurate, long ago correctly observed; and ‘orichalcum’, spelt often ‘aurichalcum’, as though it were a composite metal of mingledgoldand brass; being indeed themountainbrass (ὀρείχαλκος). The miracle play, which is ‘mystère’, in French, whence our English ‘mystery’ was originally written ‘mistère’, being properly derived from ‘ministère’, and having its name because the clergy, theministriEcclesiæ, conducted it. This was forgotten, and it then took its present form of ‘mystery’, as though so called because the mysteries of the faith were in it set out.

[258]We have here, in this bringing of the words by their supposed etymology together, the explanation of the fact that Spenser (Fairy Queen, i, 7, 44), Middleton (Works, vol. 5, pp. 524, 528, 538), and others employ ‘Tartary’ as equivalent to ‘Tartarus’ or hell.

[259]For a full discussion of this matter and fixing of the period at which ‘sinfluot’ became ‘sündflut’, see theTheol. Stud. u. Krit.vol. ii, p. 613; and Delitzsch,Genesis, 2nd ed. vol. ii, p. 210.

[260][The name of the small grape, originallyraisins de Corauntz, was transferred to theribesin the sixteenth century.]

[261]Ben Jonson,The New Inn, Act i, Sc. i.

[262][On the contrary, it is the modern “Welshrarebit” which has been mistakenly evolved out of the older “Welshrabbit” as I have shown inFolk-Etymology, p. 431. Grose has both forms in hisDictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, 1785.]

[263]‘Leghorn’ is sometimes quoted as an example of this; but erroneously; for, as Admiral Smyth has shown (The Mediterranean, p. 409) ‘Livorno’ is itself rather the modern corruption, and ‘Ligorno’ the name found on the earlier charts.

[264]Exactly the same happens in other languages; thus ‘armbrust’, a crossbow,looksGerman enough, and yet has nothing to do with ‘arm’ or ‘brust’, being a contraction of ‘arcubalista’, but a contraction under these influences. As little has ‘abenteuer’ anything to do with ‘abend’ or ‘theuer’, however it may seem to be connected with them, being indeed theProvençal‘adventura’. And ‘weissagen’ in its earlier forms had nothing in common with ‘sagen’.

[265][So Diez. But Prof. Skeat and Scheler see no reason why it should not be direct from Frenchrefuserand Low Latinrefusare, fromrefusus, rejected.]

[266]It is upon this word that De Quincey (Life and Manners, p. 70, American Ed.) says excellently well: “It is in fact by such corruptions, by off-sets upon an old stock, arising through ignorance or mispronunciation originally, that every language is frequently enriched; and new modifications of thought, unfolding themselves in the progress of society, generate for themselves concurrently appropriate expressions.... It must not be allowed to weigh against a word once fairly naturalized by all, that originally it crept in upon an abuse or a corruption. Prescription is as strong a ground of legitimation in a case of this nature, as it is in law. And the old axiom is applicable—Fieri non debuit, factum valet. Were it otherwise, languages would be robbed of much of their wealth”. [Works, vol. xiv., p. 201.]

[267][The direct opposite is the fact. The Frenchcontredansewas borrowed from the English ‘country-dance’. SeeThe Folk and their Word-Lore, p. 153.]

[268][These words are not identical. They were in use as distinct words in the fifteenth century. See N.E.D.]

[269][Dr. Murray has shown that ‘causeway’ is not a corruption of ‘causey’ but a compound of that word with ‘way’.]

[270][Prof. Skeat has demonstrated that the supposed Greek ‘rachitis’, inflammation of the back, is an ætiological invention to serve as etymon of ‘rickets’, the condition of being rickety, a purely native word. See alsoFolk-Etymology, 312.]

[271][SeeThe Folk and their Word-Lore, p. 124.]

[272]Phars.vi. 720-830.

[273]Thus in aVocabulary, 1475: Nigromansia dicitur divinatio factaper nigros.

[274][Dyce believed that it was really thus derived and distinct frompleurisy, but it was evidently modelled upon that word (Remarks on Editions of Shakespeare, p. 218).]

[275]As ‘orthography’ itself means properly “rightspelling”, it might be a curious question whether it is permissible to speak of anincorrectorthography, that is of awrongright-spelling. The question which would be thus started is one of not unfrequent recurrence, and it is very worthy of observation how often, so soon as we take note of etymologies, thiscontradictio in adjectois found to occur. I will here adduce a few examples from the Greek, the Latin, the German, and from our own tongue. Thus the Greeks having no convenient word to express a rider, apart from a rideron a horse, did not scruple to speak of thehorseman (ἱππεύς) upon anelephant. They often allowed themselves in a like inaccuracy, where certainly there was no necessity; as in usingἀνδριάςof the statue of awoman; where it would have been quite as easy to have usedεἱκώνorἄγαλμα. So too their ‘table’ (τράπεζα=τετράπεζα) involved probably thefourfeet which commonly support one; yet they did not shrink from speaking of athree-footed table (τρίπους τράπεζα), in other words, a “three-footedfour-footed”; much as though we should speak of a “three-footedquadruped”. Homer writes of a ‘hecatomb’ not of ahundred, but of twelve, oxen; and elsewhere of Hebe he says, in words not reproducible in English,νέκταρ ἐωνοχόει. ‘Tetrarchs’ were often rulers of quite other thanfourthparts of a land.Ἀκρατοςhad so come to stand for wine, without any thought more of its signifying originally theunmingled, that St. John speaks ofἄκρατος κεκερασμένος(Rev. xiv. 10), or the unmingled mingled. Boxes in which precious ointments were contained were so commonly of alabaster, that the name came to be applied to them whether they were so or not; and Theocritus celebrates “goldenalabasters”. Cicero having to mention a water-clock is obliged to call it awatersundial (solarium ex aquâ). Columella speaks of a “vintageof honey” (vindemia mellis), and Horace invites his friend to impede, not hisfoot, but his head, with myrtle (caputimpedire myrto). Thus too a German writer who desired to tell of the golden shoes with which the folly of Caligula adorned his horse could scarcely avoid speaking ofgoldenhoof-irons. The same inner contradiction is involved in such language as our own, a “falseverdict”, a “steelcuirass” (‘coriacea’ from corium, leather), “antics new” (Harrington’sAriosto), an “erroneousetymology”, a “cornchandler”; that is, a “corncandle-maker”, “ratherlate”, ‘rather’ being the comparative of ‘rathe’, early, and thus “rather late” being indeed “more early late”; and in others.

Back to Index Next