The Romance of Words (4th ed.)

ench, and the learned through modern French or directly from Latin. Obvious examples are caitiff, captive; chieftain, captain; frail, fragile. Lat. discus, a plate, quoit, gave

word has supplied us with four vocables, differentiated in me

s bearers of the title, Prince Rupert, is usually called in contemporary records the Palsgrave, from Ger. Pfalzgraf, lit. palace count, Ger. Pfalz being a very early loan from Lat. palatium. Trivet, Lat. tripes, triped-, dates back to Anglo-Saxon, its "rightness" being due to the

, from Lat. cophinus. It was originally used of a b

'st true; it i

in, a bauble,

f the Shr

has popularised in America the horrible word casket in this sense. The Greeks, fearing death less than do

us from Dutch, is a doublet of the

ll in spite both of

oe, Ch

anum, apparatus, whence Ital. mangano, with both m

EN-M

atin-English dictionaries solemn, soleyn, and sullen are used indifferently to explain such words as acerbus, agel

ith me for tha

ullen black

rd II.

et of antique, has changed considerably, but the process is easy to follow. From meaning simply ancient it acquired the sense of quaint or odd, and wa

in the ho

he mortal tem

court; and there

ate, and grinni

d II.,

cclesiastical faldstool, a litany desk. Revel is from Old Fr. reveler, Lat. rebellare, so that it is a doublet of rebel. Holyoak's Latin Dictionary (1612) has revells or routs, "concursus populi illegitimus." Its sense developm

ta, in the course of their conquests, into French (monnaie), German (Münze), and English (mint). The French and German words still have three meanings, viz., mint, coin, change. We have borrowed the French word and given it the general sense represented in French by argent, lit. silv

e-nobles and

out of their po

, The Hand

eda de ouro,

m, given, becomes Fr. dé and Eng. die (plural dice). Its Italian doublet is dado, originally cubical pedestal, hence part of wall representing continuous pedestal. Scrimmage and skirmish are variant spellings of Fr. escarmouche, from Ital. scaramuccia, of German origin (see p. 64, n.). But we have also, more immediately from Italian, the form scaramouch. Blount's Glossographia (1674) mentions Scaramoche, "a famous Italian Zani (see p. 45), or mimick, who acted here in England, 1673." Scaramouch was one of the stock characters of th

RENCH

Chater.[104] In late Latin the neuter adjective capitale, capital, was used of property. This has given, through Old Fr. chatel, our chattel, while the doublet catel has given cattle, now limited to what was once the most important form of property. Fr. cheptel is still used of cattle farmed out on a kind of profit-sharing system. This restriction of the mea

mel, Lat. gemellus, diminutive of geminus, twin. From one form we have the gimbals,

some odd gimm

t like clocks, st

ry VI.

e toothsome jumble, known to the Midlands as "brandy-snap," is the same word, this delicacy having apparently at one time been made in

the scale). It was usually an allowance of four pounds in a hundred and four, which was supposed to be equal to the sum of the "turns of t

LE-G

seen in flour, flower; metal, mettle. Flour is the flower, i.e. the finest part, of meal, Fr. fleur de f

persons who do not discriminate between metal an

s author is in the excelle

ir basest meta

C?sar,

etween metal and mettle than between the "

person, its modern meaning corresponding to the Lat. persona from which the latter started. Parson shows the popular pronunciation of er, now modified by the influence of traditional spelling. We still have it in Berkeley, clerk, Derby, sergeant, as we formerly did in merchant. Proper names, in which the orthography depends on the "taste and fancy of

gold, a p

give me; wh

world like c

'Love me and l

of Venic

e of mysterious learning. From the same source we have the French corruption grimoire

hen the vol

t spell ther

h of glamo

Last Minst

sought her

by help o

., v.

same word as quair, in the "King's Quair" i.e. book. Its Mid. English form is quayer, Old Fr. q

RN DO

up, sherbet, and (rum)-shrub are of identical origin, ultimately Arabic. Sirup, which come

y, nor ma

rowsy syrups

icine thee to

u ow'dst

lo, ii

rectly borrowed through

and water, mysel

pperfield

e for the Algerian cavalry. Both come ultimately from a Persian adjective meaning "military

ies came in a tumultuary

miliar Lett

r called a tulipa, tulipie, or Dalmatian cap" (Cotgrave). It is

ch came from Spain at an early date, though not earl

f every maravedi tho

oe, Ch

h means hermit, was given also to a kind of stork, the marabout, on account of the solitary an

dieval Lat. zephyrum connects the two forms. Crimson and carmine, both of them ultimately from Old

his is by no means obvious. Veneer, spelt fineer by Smollett, is Ger. fournieren, borrowed from Fr. fournir[107] an

ven of three threads" (Ludwig). This is an adaptation of Lat. trilix, trilic-, which, through Fr. treillis, has given Eng. trellis. We may compare the older twill, of Anglo-Saxon origin, cognate with Ger. Zwilch or Zwillich, "linnen woven with a double thread" (Ludwig). Robe, from French, is cognate with rob, and with Ger. Raub, booty, the conqueror decking himself in the spoils of the conquered. Musk is a doublet of meg in nutmeg,

O-SA

an abbreviation of Arab. amir al bahr emir on the sea. Greco-Lat. pandura, a stringed instrument, has produced an extraordinary number of corruptions, among which some

, my dear, it is called a banjore; it is an African in

orth, Belin

strument with three strings, a kit, a crou

ch at school we used to call

House,

for guiterne, Greco-Lat. cithara. Cotgrave explains mandore a

y words dimit

n

out the bosom

te samite, mys

g the

Morte d'Art

dieval Latin hexamitus, six-thread; this is Byzantine Gk. ?ξ?μιτον, whence also Old Slavonic aksamitu. The Italian form is sciamito, "a kind of sleave, feret, or filosello silke" (Florio). The word feret used here by Florio is from Ital. fioretto, little

d express'd no trib

ax and black ferr

, The Hous

coming through Old French from Greco-Lat. di-oikesis. Skirt is the Scandinavian doublet of shirt from Vulgar Lat. ex-curtus,

wilt have

y IV.,

l very early

ER-W

a villaine, slave, bondman, servile tenant" (Cotgrave), was a peasant attached to his lord's ville or domain, Lat. villa. For the degeneration in meaning we may compare Eng. boor and churl (p. 84), and Fr. manant, a clodhopper, lit. a dweller (see manor, p. 9). A butcher, Fr. boucher, must originally have dealt in goat's flesh, Fr. bouc, goat; cf. Ital. beccai

s that Cornwa

eir meiny, stra

r, i

er, a swashbuckler, a swaggerer, a high way theefe, a hackster" (Florio). Those inclined to moralise may see in these words a proof that the arrogance of the great man's flunkey was curbed in England earlier t

, als men victorie brandt." Walnut is related to Wales, Cornwall, the Walloons, Wallachia and Sir William Wallace. It means "foreign" nut. This very wide spread wal is supposed to represent the Celtic tribal name Volc?. It was applied by the English to the Celts, and by the Germans to the French and

t to keepe off heate and rayne. Also a kinde of round thing like a round skreene that gentlemen use in Ital

ori

terre d'ombre

elf in poor a

nd of umber s

Like I

evelopment of carol is very like that of ballad. It is from Old Fr. carolle, "a kinde of dance wherein many may dance together; also, a carroll, or Christmas song" (Cotgrave). The form corolla is found in Proven?al, and c

IN-M

to the chapel in which was preserved the cape or cloak of St Martin of Tours. The doublet capel survives in Capel Court, near the Exchange. Ger. Kapelle al

the trum

ance and the n

V., i

given sennet, common in the stage directions of Elizab

which comes, through French, from Span. junquillo, a diminutive from Lat. juncus, rush. The plant is named from its rush-like leaves. Ditto, Italian, lit. "said," and ditty, Old Fr. dité, are both past participles,[110] from the Latin verbs dico and dicto respectively. Th

alled from its preying on poultry. Merino is related to mayor, which comes, through French, from Lat. maior, greater. Span. merino, Vulgar Lat. *majorinus, means both a magistrate and a superintendent of sheep-walks. From the latter meaning comes that of "sheepe driven from the winter pastures to the sommer pastures, or the wooll of those sheepe" (Percyvall). Portcullis is from Old Fr. porte coulisse, sliding door. Fr. coul

ormerly sol, a halfpenny, comes, like Ital. soldo, from Lat. solidus, the meaning of which appears also in the Italian participle soldato, a soldier, lit. a paid man. This Italian word has passed into French and German, displacing the older cognates soudard and S?ldner, which now have a

TNO

ttesca, "a kinde of rugged unpolished

the horse is still testified to by th

name is for cheater

rlier avers de pois (poid

a case of early folk-etymology and

but it is more probable that furnier

Crowther

sense of middle-man points to contamination

Italian past partici

used for str