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Justice David B. (Editor) - Merriam-Websters Book of Word Histories

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Justice David B. (Editor) Merriam-Websters Book of Word Histories

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Merriam-Webster, Incorporated. 2011. 2688 pages.When we go to our dictionaries, it is usually because we want some bit of information that is immediately useful to us: the meaning of an unfamiliar word, the pronunciation of a word we have seen but never heard, the spelling of a word we know but cannot recall the physical shape of, or an appropriate point at which to divide a word at the end of a line. We may seldom take the time to assimilate the information presented in the etymology of the word we are looking up. It is rare indeed for anyone but a scholar to have a pressing need to know the origin of a word, and the conventions by means of which the information is given may be confusing or intimidating to us.
It is nonetheless true that many of our words have interesting histories, and scholarly learning is not required to appreciate them. Once a readers interest has been piqued by the realization that behind one English word lies a myth of the ancient Greeks, while another word can be traced to a twentieth-century American comic strip, it is perfectly easy to become addicted to the fascinating study of etymology, at least in an amateur way.One of the aims of Merriam-Websters Book of Word Histories is to foster the readers interest in that study in the hope that it will deepen into fascination. Although the articles in this book have been arranged alphabetically for ease of reference, they invite browsers to move about in the book as a cross-reference or a whim takes them. Many thousands of English words have histories of more than routine interest, but only a small sampling could find space here. Still, the more than six hundred articles which form the heart of the book, many of them devoted to several etymologically or semantically related words, offer material to catch the fancy of all readers, whatever their interests. In part because throughout its history English has been highly receptive to outside influences on its wordstock, prolific in creating new words from its own familiar elements, and given to the development of new meanings over the course of time, these articles are extremely diverse. In them will be encountered several of the people, famous or obscure in their own right, whose names have become generic words. One can learn of processes of language, like folk etymology, that transform existing words into new ones and can catch glimpses of the social, cultural, and religious history, not of the English-speaking nations alone, but also of the peoples from whom we have borrowed new words. But an inventory of all the contents of these articles would soon grow tiresome. Readers are invited to discover for themselves the variety this book contains.At the same time that Merriam-Websters Book of Word Histories attempts to satisfy the readers curiosity about the stories associated with many English words, it also aims to domesticate that often formidable beast, the dictionary etymology. Thus, nearly every entry, whether it includes an article or merely refers to an article elsewhere in the book, is accompanied by an etymology presented in the style ofWebsters Third New International Dictionary, though with cross-references (which are likely to be more frustrating than revealing outside of the dictionary) omitted. The table of abbreviations used in these etymologies will give readers much assistance with the compressed presentation of information in an etymology, and the pronunciation symbols used in several articles are explained in a separate section. Finally, an interesting and helpful introduction follows this preface and discusses briefly such matters as the history of English and its relation to its language family, the sources of English loanwords, and the development of new meanings in the language itself. Its closing paragraphs are devoted to a clarification of some points about the etymologies given in this book so that the reader may know just what they sayand do not say. Everyone who reads this book will find that a careful perusal of the introduction repays the time and attention devoted to it by enhancing appreciation and understanding of both the articles and the etymologies.

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Merriam-Webster's Book of Word Histories

Merriam-Websters Book of Word Histories - image 1
Merriam-Webster, Incorporated
Springfield, Massachusetts
Merriam-Websters Book of Word Histories - image 2
A GENUINE MERRIAM-WEBSTER

The name Webster alone is no guarantee of excellence. It is used by a number of publishers and may serve mainly to mislead an unwary buyer.

Merriam-Webster TM is the name you should look for when you consider the purchase of dictionaries and other fine reference books. It carries the reputation of a company that has been publishing since 1831 and is your assurance of quality and authority.


Copyright 1991 by Merriam-Webster, Inc.
Merriam-Webster's Book of Word Histories
ISBN 978-0-87779-721-0
All rights reserved. No part of this work covered by the copyrights hereon may be reproduced or copied in any form or by any meansgraphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, taping, or information storage and retrieval systemswithout written permission of the publisher.
CONTENTS
Preface

When we go to our dictionaries, it is usually because we want some bit of information that is immediately useful to us: the meaning of an unfamiliar word, the pronunciation of a word we have seen but never heard, the spelling of a word we know but cannot recall the physical shape of, or an appropriate point at which to divide a word at the end of a line. We may seldom take the time to assimilate the information presented in the etymology of the word we are looking up. It is rare indeed for anyone but a scholar to have a pressing need to know the origin of a word, and the conventions by means of which the information is given may be confusing or intimidating to us.

It is nonetheless true that many of our words have interesting histories, and scholarly learning is not required to appreciate them. Once a reader's interest has been piqued by the realization that behind one English word lies a myth of the ancient Greeks, while another word can be traced to a twentieth-century American comic strip, it is perfectly easy to become addicted to the fascinating study of etymology, at least in an amateur way.

One of the aims of Merriam-Webster's Book of Word Histories is to foster the reader's interest in that study in the hope that it will deepen into fascination. Although the articles in this book have been arranged alphabetically for ease of reference, they invite browsers to move about in the book as a cross-reference or a whim takes them. Many thousands of English words have histories of more than routine interest, but only a small sampling could find space here. Still, the more than six hundred articles which form the heart of the book, many of them devoted to several etymologically or semantically related words, offer material to catch the fancy of all readers, whatever their interests. In part because throughout its history English has been highly receptive to outside influences on its wordstock, prolific in creating new words from its own familiar elements, and given to the development of new meanings over the course of time, these articles are extremely diverse. In them will be encountered several of the people, famous or obscure in their own right, whose names have become generic words. One can learn of processes of language, like folk etymology, that transform existing words into new ones and can catch glimpses of the social, cultural, and religious history, not of the English-speaking nations alone, but also of the peoples from whom we have borrowed new words. But an inventory of all the contents of these articles would soon grow tiresome. Readers are invited to discover for themselves the variety this book contains.

At the same time that Merriam-Webster's Book of Word Histories attempts to satisfy the reader's curiosity about the stories associated with many English words, it also aims to domesticate that often formidable beast, the dictionary etymology. Thus, nearly every entry, whether it includes an article or merely refers to an article elsewhere in the book, is accompanied by an etymology presented in the style of Webster's Third New International Dictionary , though with cross-references (which are likely to be more frustrating than revealing outside of the dictionary) omitted. The follows this preface and discusses briefly such matters as the history of English and its relation to its language family, the sources of English loanwords, and the development of new meanings in the language itself. Its closing paragraphs are devoted to a clarification of some points about the etymologies given in this book so that the reader may know just what they sayand do not say. Everyone who reads this book will find that a careful perusal of the introduction repays the time and attention devoted to it by enhancing appreciation and understanding of both the articles and the etymologies.

The articles are essentially the work of seven members of the editorial team of Merriam-Webster, working under the direction of Dr. David B. Justice, editor of etymology. They are Dr. Justice himself, E. Ward Gilman, James G. Lowe, Julie A. Collier, Stephen J. Perrault, Michael G. Belanger, and Kelly L. Tierney. Robert D. Copeland served as copy editor for the project. Eileen M. Haraty was responsible for cross-reference. Proofs were read by many of the editors already named, and also by Kathleen M. Doherty, Daniel J. Hopkins, Peter D. Haraty, Paul F. Cappellano, and Karin M. Henry. The difficult job of typing the manuscript was ably accomplished by Georgette B. Boucher, Barbara A. Winkler, and Florence A. Fowler of the editorial department's clerical and typing staff, as well as by Helene Gingold, department secretary.

Frederick C. Mish
Editor

Introduction

A look at the origins of the words that make up our language involves also a look at the origins of our language itself. With the abundance of words derived from Latin and from Greek by way of Latin, the casual observer might guess that English would be, like French, Spanish, and Italian, a Romance language derivative of the Latin spoken by the ancient Romans. But although the Romans made a few visits to Britain in the first century A.D., long before the English were therebefore there was even an EnglandEnglish is not a Romance language. In terms of its genetic stock, English is a member of the Germanic group, and thus a sister of such extinct tongues as Old Norse and Gothic and such modern ones as Swedish, Dutch, and German.

The history of English is intimately tied to the history of the British Isles over the last 1500 years or so. We may speak of English as having its beginnings with the conquest and settlement of a large part of the island of Britain by Germanic tribes from the European continent in the fifth century, although the earliest written documents of the language belong to the seventh century. Of course these Germanic peoples did not, upon their arrival in England, suddenly begin to speak a new language. They spoke the closely related Germanic tongues of their continental homelands. From these developed the English language. In fact, the words English and England are derived from the name of one of these early Germanic peoples, the Angles. From its beginnings English has been gradually changing and evolving, as language tends to do, until the earliest written records have become all but incomprehensible to the speaker of Modern English without specialized training.

By virtue of being a member of the Germanic group, English belongs to a still larger family of languages called Indo-European. The languages of this family, which includes most of the modern European languages as well as such important languages of antiquity as Latin, Greek and Sanskrit, all resemble each other in a number of ways, particularly in vocabulary. One needs no training in the fine points of philology to see that the similarities between forms like English father, German vater, Latin pater, Greek patr, and Sanskrit pit, all of which have the same meaning, are not likely to be the result of accident. We account for resemblances like these by the assumption that all of these languages are descended from a common ancestor. We have no written remnants of this assumed ancestral language, which was spoken thousands of years ago, perhaps in central Europeeven the location is not certain. But we can learn something about it by comparing its descendants, and it has been given a nameProto-Indo-European. Words in the various Indo-European languages which are ultimately derived from a common ancestral word assumed to have existed in Proto-Indo-European are called cognates. The words mentioned above with father are all cognates. The variations between the initial p of some of the words and the f of others is accounted for by philologists with reference to regular patterns of sound changes over long periods of time.

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