Word Histories - A Glossary Of Unusual Word Origins
Cód:
491_9781443731867
This edition of WORD HISTORIES is a revision and enlargement of a volume which was originally published in England in 1935. FOREWORD: Words, like individuals, have their histories. English words, for the most part, are either direct translations, or descendants, so to speak, from an other language, or are Anglo-Saxon words, used today substantially in the same sense as they were in pre-Norman days. As the scope of this volume is necessarily limited, the words listed include mainly those that have wandered, in varying de grees, from their original meanings. For example, the title Duke is omitted because it is directly descended from French due, which in turn is from Latin dux, ducis, a leader. On the other hand Lady justifies its place here for the reason that its progenitor is Anglo-Saxon hlaefdige, a kneader of the loaf, the woman who prepared bread for the oven. The social climbing of such a word furnishes a temptation to refer to its development as its genealogy and to forget that the science of word origins is etymology. The words in this volume were assembled to satisfy a curiosity aroused by a study of Old English, particularly in connection with researches made into Anglo-Saxon laws and charters. It was during the course of such a study that the many engaging word personalities attracted my interest, and with the enthusiasm of a collector, I have yielded to the temptation of including other specimens encountered during many years of the practice of law, where the background of a word seemed to war rant it. PREFACE: Old English, or Anglo-Saxon, is a language which f ew would now understand. With its roots in Teu tonic soil, it developed under the Roman invasion, and was nourished by the subsequent overrunning of the British Isles by the Danes, the Angles, the Saxons and other races of northwest continental Europe. The greatest changes in the language were, however, those that followed the battle of Hastings and the business-like conquest of all things Anglo-S
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