Here are the spelling goofs on these boards during the last three days. Errata; permissable for permissible its finally started ... for it's finally started existance for existence are as much of a "cause" than fear. for as much as or more than people's perspectives become effected by them. for affected by them differents for difference
I haven't included any mistakes that appeared to be typos. ******************************************************************* 11-21-05, 08:16 PM jusork Oh! I see me! Big Grin Thanks, Frank.
11-23-05, 05:37 PM kittypal I DID think permissible was permissable!! Razz Smile
11-25-05, 09:01 AM frankvan Errata; (Since 11/22/05
indited for indicted focussed for focused weather for whether (typical of the type that escape the spell-checker) celebate for celibate relegiously for religiously camaflouge for camouflage
(No one needs to make public confessions or apologies. Just mend our ways. No one's perfect.)
11-25-05, 09:49 AM Professor
quote: focussed for focused
Either is correct.
11-25-05, 09:59 AM newnickname I guess if you follow the rule consonant-vowel-consonant ending = add another consonant in derivatives*, 'focussed' is the correct version. But isn't 'focus' Latin?
*bit - bitten wood - wooden
11-25-05, 11:51 AM FredPuli
quote: Originally posted by newnickname: But isn't 'focus' Latin?
Yes, its meaning has been adapted though. It is the Latin for a hearth, a fireplace. That's because the blazing fire in the hearth was the 'focal point' of the room, where everyone's gaze was centred (pre-television Wink ) Neat, huh ?
How does its Latin origin have a bearing on the spelling ?
11-25-05, 11:53 AM GarColga
quote: Originally posted by frankvan: Errata; (Since 11/22/05
weather for whether
Whew! This is the worst spell of whether we've had in years.
11-25-05, 11:56 AM FredPuli
quote: Originally posted by GarColga:
quote: Originally posted by frankvan: Errata; (Since 11/22/05
weather for whether
Whew! This is the worst spell of whether we've had in years.
Inspired! Big Grin
11-25-05, 11:58 AM babthrower
quote: Originally posted by GarColga: Whew! This is the worst spell of whether we've had in years.
Big Grin Big Grin Big Grin
11-25-05, 12:02 PM DorianGreyed It took a moment for that to sink in, but it was very funny. 11-25-05, 06:13 PM Professor
quote: Inspired! Big Grin
Ditto Big Grin
quote: guess if you follow the rule consonant-vowel-consonant ending = add another consonant in derivatives*, 'focussed' is the correct version. But isn't 'focus' Latin?
*bit - bitten wood - wooden
With verbs ending in < consonant-E-L >, such as travel, cancel, and model, the rule I understood was that doubling the final L in an inflected form is optional, correct either way. The preference is one of American vs. British usage: Americans tend to write single L's and other English writers use double L's. Thus traveled or travelled, the latter more common in the U.K and Canada.
Evidently this generalizes to words like focus(s)ed as mentioned above. One exception would be words ending in -R. Example: the past tense of water is watered and never waterred. Are there other exceptions?
This message has been edited. Last edited by: Professor, 11-25-05 05:46 PM
11-26-05, 12:32 AM FredPuli
quote: Originally posted by Professor: One exception would be words ending in -R. Example: the past tense of water is watered and never waterred. Are there other exceptions?
I've dug up interred , for a start Wink It just occurred to me. There,you see, double R recurred , as soon as I referred to it. With any luck my enthusiasm for this hunt will have petered out by the end of this paragraph.Hey, it just did !
No. See?I wasn't deterred Wink
11-26-05, 01:18 AM FredPuli Looking at the above it now occurs to me that Latin may be at the root of this. The words cited in double R had double R in Latin. So we have interred from in and terra ('in the ground') , occurred from occurrere (originally and literally 'to run into an obstruction, something getting in the way'), recurred from recurrere ('to run again' ), referred from referre ('to carry back' ) and deterred from de and terrere ( 'from' and 'to frighten'). It is just that we lost the double R in the present tense of these verbs.
11-26-05, 02:15 AM Professor I see. I hastily inferred a general property of verbs ending in R that's unfortunately hampered by numerous counterexamples. Smile
Interesting that "focus" is Latin for hearth.
11-26-05, 04:26 AM FredPuli The guess is proving valid. The verb 'to peter' is of unknown origin (possibly French but not Latin), 'water' is Germanic, 'hamper' is Old English. There seem to be precious few Latin root words for verbs ending -er: perhaps only two are common viz. ferre and currere, providing all the -ferred and -curred endings.
Noah Webster is responsible for American traveler and traveled.His simplification and standardising of American spelling (but not speling Wink ) created these. 'Travel' is C14 English travaillen and Dr Johnson has the words as 'traveller' and 'travelled', citing Shakespeare, Dryden, Chapman and others. He surmises, correctly, that it is related to 'travail', a comparison which all of us can understand Big Grin. In his day, he notes, writers often use the spelling 'travail' for both but he suggests the words be differentiated. ( He must have suffered less in his journeys to Scotland and her islands than we might have guessed). It is interesting that he and we write 'travailing' and 'travailed',as did writers long before him, but that's different Big Grin
Note: Collin's Dictionary says that 'travail', from French travaillier, meaning ' the pangs of childbirth, painful exertion', is ultimately from an unattested Vulgar Latin word meaning 'to torture', from trepalium an instrument of torture involving the use of three stakes.What's the betting that the lexicographer deciding on that derivation was a mother ? Wink
11-26-05, 09:07 AM frankvan Sheeeesh! Okay, already. Focussed and/or focused are both acceptable. You guys have certainly beaten that dead horse to a pulp. How I miss Maiku. Frown
11-26-05, 12:21 PM juanruiz
quote: is ultimately from an unattested Vulgar Latin word meaning 'to torture', from trepalium an instrument of torture involving the use of three stakes.What's the betting that the lexicographer deciding on that derivation was a mother ?
Maybe. But I can envision the following evolution:
intervocalic /p/>/b/>/v/ (The latter a common change from VL to Romance,e.g., habere>avoir)
/e/>/a/ by assimilation with the following /a/
/l/+ yod palatalizes to /y/ and also causes the diphthong as the /i/ jumps back to join /a/. Turning it into a verb is simply a case of neologism. The VL -/um/ was lost in French.
11-26-05, 12:45 PM babthrower I love it when you guys talk dirty!
(Heads up, Karrow)
11-26-05, 12:49 PM juanruiz
quote: I love it when you guys talk dirty!
Yeah, but you can get away with it when it sounds intellectual. Good thing I didn't mention that /b/ is a bilabial. Smile
11-26-05, 01:10 PM babthrower Spelling errors Yeah, and didja ever notice that all the naughty bits are named in Latin? Like regina and penates? Red Face
11-26-05, 01:21 PM FredPuli
quote: Originally posted by juanruiz:
quote: is ultimately from an unattested Vulgar Latin word meaning 'to torture', from trepalium an instrument of torture involving the use of three stakes.What's the betting that the lexicographer deciding on that derivation was a mother ?
Maybe. But I can envision the following evolution:
intervocalic /p/>/b/>/v/ (The latter a common change from VL to Romance,e.g., habere>avoir)
/e/>/a/ by assimilation with the following /a/
/l/+ yod palatalizes to /y/ and also causes the diphthong as the /i/ jumps back to join /a/. Turning it into a verb is simply a case of neologism.
Yes JR. The full history is : tripalis, from tres 'three' and palus 'a stake', means 'having or being supported by three stakes or pales'. This word is attested,being in a work by the writer on husbandry Varro (d. 27BC ). He was writing about a support for a vine.This useful device was the model for the instrument of torture known only from Late Latin text as trepalium. 'Unattested' seems an etymologists word for 'surmised' but, anyhow, the spoken Vulgar Latin and unattested verb from it is tripaliare and the Old French verb is travaillier, as stated.
The word 'trivet' comes to mind. This three-footed stand for hot plates and pans would be so described in Latin. The Latin for 'having three feet' as in a stool, three -legged table or trivet is tripes, so there's an example of P becoming V in a similar word. (Why we use the Greek for three -footed, tripous, as the root for 'tripod' or tripos, an exam course originally of three legs, is.... just the richness of English Big Grin )
Now, Professor, was that sufficiently maikuesque? It got away from the original topic quite well but it had no phonetic symbols . Also it didn't say that tripos was strictly a Latin word when it came here in the C16 as tripus but the ending was changed to make it look more Greek, so it wasn't still Greek before Roll Eyes Big Grin
11-26-05, 01:21 PM juanruiz In Latino veritas?
11-26-05, 01:38 PM FredPuli
quote: Originally posted by babthrower: Yeah, and didja ever notice that all the naughty bits are named in Latin? Like regina and penates? Red Face
The best is the Latin penes usually translated as 'in the hands of' (well, it was so translated in my class !). Surely it was related to another word? Spoilsports would say that it meant 'in the possession or power of' usually (but it comes to the same thing Wink )
The Latin word anus means 'an old woman'.(Strange what of the vocabulary young boys remember, isn't it, when they forget so much ?)
(All right, a Latin word anus does means 'backside' : 'old woman' has short 'A 'and the other word has long 'A').
11-26-05, 01:56 PM juanruiz
quote: 'old woman' has short 'A'
Which must have made sitting for long periods of time uncomfortable. Now, what was the original question? 11-26-05, 06:59 PM Professor
quote: Now, what was the original question?
No, What was the next question. Who was the original question. I dunno...third base! (apologies to A & C ). Big Grin
quote: Now, Professor, was that sufficiently maikuesque?
It was frankvan who mentioned Maiku, though of course I miss him too. You guys are speaking a foreign language to me -- I don't know all the lingo. I don't even own an OED. Wink What part of linguistics does this discussion falls under?
Old woman, huh... The things you learn on AnswerPool! 11-26-05, 07:40 PM
babthrower Of course, then there's freetran Latin:
Motorolus interruptus - Hold on, I'm going into a tunnel.
Et tu, pluribus unum? - The government just stabbed me in the back!
Domino vobiscum - The pizza guy is here.
(No, of course I didn't make them up!) 11-27-05, 07:44 AM
FredPuli
quote: Originally posted by babthrower: Of course, then there's freetran Latin
And Latin as English:
" Caesar adsum jam forte Brutus aderat Caesar sic in omnibus Brutus sic in at "
(Less good in American as you don't have a meal called tea . Don't suppose anyone here or there calls a bus an omnibus now, either)
This is ingenious because every word is genuine Latin and it all makes a sort of sense: " By chance I am close by Caesar. Brutus was present . So, Caesar [is] with everyone . Brutus likewise,and yet..." 'At'( 'and yet; but') is often used to introduce a statement describing something terrible or dramatic, so is this a reporter or aide in the forum seeing that Brutus and his conspirators have just come back and so breaking off because......AAARGH ?
11-27-05, 10:12 AM babthrower "Less good in American as you don't have a meal called tea," Fred comments
Also none of our N. American dialects includes dropped aitches. Would work better in Aussie, maybe.
"...so is this a reporter or aide in the forum seeing that Brutus and his conspirators have just come back and so breaking off because..."
... they had found the weapons of mass distruction!
This message has been edited. Last edited by: DorianGreyed,
