"I'll be chawswizzled!"

Found something neat:

"Scurryfunge"

"Jerp"

"scandaroon"

"bowelhive"


sound like words made up in a Lewis Carroll book? Nope they're Forgotten English: from the Word Museum.

Today's New Word

Mendacity: 1646. [-eccl. L. mendacitas, f.] The quality of being mendacious; habitual lying or decieving; also, a lie or falsehood.

the context:

"...owing no doubt to the fact that, despite five decades of officially imposed communist mendacity, the Catholic Church never stopped teaching the truth."

Idols

Shorter Oxford English Dictionary:

Bibliolatry: [Gr. -here follows something in Greek-] book-worship; excessive reverence for the mere letter of the Bible;

Bibliomancy: divination by books, or by verses of the Bible

-mania: rage for collecting books;

-phagist: a devourer of books;

-taph: one who buries books under lock and key;

Bibliophile: a lover of books; a book-fancier;

Bibliophilism: the principles and practice of b.

Bibliophilous: addicted to bibliophily.

Liturgiae Sive Missae 1560

Now, this

[sorry, Ebay dumped the pic. Pity.]

is a book...

De ritu missae et eucharistia:

This 16th Century work was written by the noted French controversialist Claude de Sainctes in 1560.

At the age of fifteen de Sainctes joined the Canons Regular of Saint-Cheron, and was sent to the College of Navarre in Paris, where he received the degree of Doctor of Theology (1555) On account of the erudition of his early works and the aptitude which he showed for controversy, he was called to the Conference of Poissy held in 1561 between the Catholics and the Huguenots, at which Theodore of Beza and Father Lainez, general of the Jesuits, were present.

He was afterwards deputed to the Council of Trent to represent, with Simon Vigor, the University of Paris. Upon his return he acquired a notable reputation by his sermons and his discussions with Protestants. He published a work against their spoliation of Catholic churches and a vigorous declaration against the doctrines of Calvin and Theodore of Beza; the latter replied and drew upon himself a new attack from Claude de Sainctes.

At the same time he charged the King of France by his treatise on "L'ancien naturel des Français" never to tolerate heretics and against these latter he defended the dogma of the Church by an exhaustive treatise on the Eucharist. Through the patronage of the Cardinal of Lorraine, he was appointed to the Bishopric of Evreux (1575).

He was very zealous in his efforts to convert Protestants. He assisted at the provincial Council of Rouen (1581) and published its records in French. When the League became active he took sides with it and worked to gain partisans, but the royal troops took possession of Evreux and the bishop was forced to flee. Unfortunately for him there were found among his papers writings in which he approved the murder of Henry III and maintained that one could likewise kill his successor. Arrested and arraigned before the Parlement of Caen, he was condemned to death as guilty of high treason. At the request of the Cardinal of Bourbon and of several bishops, Henry IV commuted his sentence to life imprisonment, and he was confined in the château of Crèvecoeur where he died two months later.

His works were published, some in Latin and others in French. The more important are: "Liturgiae sive missae SS. Patrum Jacobi, Basilii J. Chrysostomi" (Greek-Latin, Paris, 1560)...

which last you can buy today on eBay for a starting bid of $600.00

History is yours for six bills.

MJ

Fraternal Correction

I just thought I would put up a disclaimer.

I am an amateur. When they tried to teach me grammar in school, I daydreamed. I was taught somewhat haphazardly at home by my mother and grandfather whose contribution was to instill in me more enthusiasm than skill.

As implied in the address bar, I have no credentials whatever, except that I love language, use it every day and was taught to care about its proper use. The purpose and mission of the Incorruptible Grammarian, the title of which is meant to be ironic more than descriptive, is to explore strange new words, to seek out new verb tenses and new constructions, to boldly...well, you get the drift.

So anyone who reads me here, is most welcome to add a comment with corrections. I long to be corrected, improved and brought out of the darkness of my postmodern education into the light and life of Good English.

The other thing I should put right up front is that I cannot spell. I don't know if the problem is genetic or learned, (the nature vs. nurture debate may come up later,) but I have had it all my life. My grandfather, a very learned man in the old manner, pushed me towards dictionaries as soon as I was old enough to read one and started me on a lifetime of loving words for their own sake, but his object was to get me to spell them properly, at which he failed abjectly.

But not to despair! I am surrounded by people who actually paid attention in school. I've got a Greek chorus of PhD's and other smart friends who really know what they're about.1.

The other thing I do habitually, is misuse, commas. I don't do anything realy awful like try to end sentences with them, or join independent clauses, or anything, I just like to use a comma whereever my mental voice breaks for a mental breath. (Neither is my typing immaculately concieved, as you will note,) I mean, I know what a semi-colon is for, I just like commas. I'm sure that Mr. Fowler are has something to say about their use and we will look at them in detail, but I will continue misusing them. It is probably another genetic fault; they are finding that more and more of our flaws and concupicences are due to our genes. I hope 2. we will one day be able to find the gene for Original Sin and thereby obviate the necessity of confessing our sins, but until then, I can only beg the indulgence of the reader for my comma enthusiasms.

Corrections, once they have been verified by the accepted authorities - which include the conversation around the breakfast table - will be duly posted and expanded upon.3.

To start us off, we have a note, our first, from Fr. Spiritual Director, whose corrections both in the areas of eternal salvation and spelling and usage are most welcome, (and due to his exalted status as a member of the clergy, I don't mind his rubbing it in, one little bit, no sir!).

He sends this note, "But what is it that all those people are pouring over Elvish dictionaries? Beer? Or are they just poring over them?"

Hmmmnn, says I. Let's see what the elder gods of lexicography have to say,

Pocket Oxford:
Pour v.t. & i. Issue or make issue in a stream or shower or crowd from a receptacle or source....

Pore 2., v.i. Have the eyes or mind intent (over book, writing &tc.,)

MJ.

1.We will address one of those Perennial Vexers, (hereafter referred to as "PV's",) to wit, the admissability of ending a sentence with a preposition. I have read what Fowler had to say about it and was impressed. We will be debunking the Churchill myth as well. (Damn his boots!)

2.Note to self: do a thing on the common abuse of "hopefully," as in "Hopefully, I will some day learn to spell."

3 See note 1., re. "...upon."

Less lessons

The Appropriate Use Of Less And Fewer
by Diane Sandford

After watching a particularly annoying television commercial for a new local bank that promised less paperwork to set up an account, less time to process transactions, and less lines at the counter, I realized that many of us do not understand the appropriate use of less and fewer. In the bank commercial, grammar fell victim to a misguided attempt for consistency in sentence structure.

To Boldly Split Infinitives That Have Never Been Split Before

Of course, we will be addressing issues that are as perennially vexing to language-loons as the proper placement and usage of silverware is to Miss Manners mavens.

For example:

Why, just why can people, writers I mean, not grasp the difference between "its" and "it's"?

What is the lost secret of "they're, there and their" and why is it lost?

Are archaisms in language strictly for pretentious snobs who write grammar blogs or do they perform a genuine service to clarity, conciseness and euphony? Or even to truth, beauty and goodness? What about freedom, justice and mercy?

What precisely is the political function among leftist academics and feminists for turning nouns into verbs? ("Let us journey together..." "I will utilize that hammer to impact that nail...") And, in a related question, why do Catholic liberals have such a strange aversion to the definite article?

Why doesn't English have a second person plural and how can we acquire one? Was it taken away in some revolution in the distant past? Is it a part of the loss of the vocative in English?

Was Orwell right?

MJ

Amateur Philology

Something I have noticed since the LOTR films came out is a lot of eager young readers deciding they want to be philologists when they grow up. I would say that this is a Good Thing. It is a more real and useful and healthy desire than say, this.

If you admire Einstein, become a physicist; don't become someone who goes to science fiction conventions. If you love Tolkien, become what he was, become interested in the things he loved. It is a good thing to have chosen a good man as a role model, but the point of having a role model is to emulate him, to learn what he knew, to love what he loved and allow his love to teach you things. Imagine what he would have to say to all those people who spend their time pouring over Elvish dictionaries, or writing them!

So I think the impulse is a good one, to want to learn what he knew, to learn about language, literature and the meaning of things through the meaning of words. He was a teacher after all.

If you want to be an amateur (or even a professional) philologist, it will take some serious dedication and a willingness to spend a lot of your time alone. You will also have to resign yourself to being misunderstood. People think grammar and the study of language and literature is dull. Well, learn to be pround of being dull. Interesting people are usually very unhappy, do too much cocaine and get married too often.

No one took Tolkien seriously either until he translated Beowulf. And no one takes him seriously now that postmodernism has taken over the literary criticism trade. His professional thesis was guided by his ideas about Absolute Truth: existence of, and are now as much out of the mainstream as is his version of Catholicism.

The current thought in literary criticism is something about which I know very little, having just started in the amateur philologist hobby myself. But we are going to get into it, believe me.

The only point I wish to make here is that the love of language, literature and words, their meanings, nuances, origins and history is the quintessential humanistic study. Philology is, in its essence, the study of man, since man is the only creature to whom it is natural to use words to communicate, and to make up stories to get across important ideas.

Everything that is worth saying is worth saying as a story. Christ knew this, and I think Tolkien learned it from the Master.

MJ

What is a...

I have seen a grammarian toure and plume himselfe over a single line in Horace.

In defining a word, I tend to work from smallest to largest:

Pocket Oxford first
then Concise Oxford
then Shorter Oxford

I haven't been able to afford either the Big Oxford or the Condensed version with the six pages per page and the little battery-operated magnifying lens and light. But when I do...

So:

Grammarian:

Pocket Oxford,
grammarian n. one versed in g.

Concise Oxford,
n. One versed in grammar, philologist.

Shorter Oxford,
n. 1. One versed in the knowledge of grammar, or of language; a philologist; a writer upon, or teacher of grammar. 2. A grammar- school boy (1607) "I have seen a G. toure and plume himselfe over a single line in Horace." Sir. T. Browne. Hence Grammarianism, the principles or practice of a g.

testing

Is that a participle?