by Roseanna White | Oct 29, 2012 | Word of the Week
First of all, I would like to report that I finished up Whispers from the Shadows on Thursday! Woot! It checked in way too long (130,000 words instead of the 116,000 I was to shoot for), but everyone agrees that it’s better to have too much than to run out of story with 20K to go. 😉 Now it’s time to shift my focus to editing–and hunker down as Sandy swings up this way. She’s supposed to hit us tomorrow morning, with tropical storm force winds hitting us here in the mountains. Should be interesting.
Anyway. Rereading one of my chapters yesterday, I was inspired to look up the word card to see when the phrase “playing the ______ card” came into being. So I thought I’d share my findings. =)
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| Playing card from the 1895 Vanity Fair deck |
The word card itself is really old–the English word dates from 1400. It’s taken from the Latin charta, which means “leaf of paper,” which in turn comes from the Greek khartes, “layers of papyrus.” Which, in its turn, is probably derived straight from the Egyptian word.
The most familiar meaning of “playing cards” dates in English and French from the 1590s. The listing didn’t tell me about calling cards, but I happen to know those were around for a long while, especially popular in the 19th century. Greeting cards came about in 1869, and people who are original earned the name card in 1836 but usually had “smart” in front of it back then and came from the playing card sense.
“Card table” dates from 1713 and “house of cards” in the figurative sense is from 1640s–supposedly from Milton. To have a card up one’s sleeve is 1898; and, finally, the one I was actually looking for! LOL. To play the _______ card is from 1886, originally the Orange card, meaning “appeal to Northern Irish Protestant sentiment (for political advantage).” Who knew?
So yeah, my hero’s best friend couldn’t accuse him of playing the _____ card, which is fine. But I sure learned something in the looking up of it!
by Roseanna White | Oct 22, 2012 | Word of the Week
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| A Dream of a Girl Before Sunrise by Karl Briullov, 1830 |
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This is a word that I had no idea had anything interesting to it so was very shocked to find such a long entry! And at this point, can’t even remember why I bothered looking it up, LOL.
Dream in the literal sense–a sleeping vision–dates from the 13th century and is related to a number of similar words in other Germanic languages, including a few with a meaning of “merriment or noise,” “illusion, deception, or phantasm,” and from there “ghost, apparition.” Our
dream though, the Old English word carried only the literal meaning and those of
Joy, mirth, and (for some reason…) music.
There were, however, two identically spelled Old English words. The one that meant a literal dream and the one that meant “revelry.” Folks have tried to prove that the modern
dream came from the revelry one instead of the expected one, but to no avail. As it turns out, Old English literature often avoided using the word for the primary purpose to avoid confusion and would use
swefn (sleep) in its place.
Who knew?
But here’s the thing that really surprised me. It wasn’t until 1931 (1931!?) that dream gained the meaning of “ideal of aspiration.” Can you believe that?? I had no clue it was so new. And now so need to rewrite a line of my manuscript…and wonder how many times I’ve used it wrong in other books. Argh! Seriously. Never thought to look this one up. But apparently this modern meaning came from an 1888 sense of “something of dream-like beauty of charm.”
Yeah, definitely one of those words I never thought to question and now will never look at the same again. 😉
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by Roseanna White | Oct 15, 2012 | Word of the Week
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| Christ Healing the Sick by Washington Allston, 1813 |
Oh yeah, going for controversy this week. 😉
So here’s the deal. I’ve heard from quite a few sources that we moderns are misusing the word nauseous. That it ought not mean “to feel sick or queasy” but that it rather means “to cause a feeling of nausea.”
Now, I’ve heard this from sources I trust, but they never quote their sources, and I’m now on a quest to figure out why in the world this is touted as grammatical fact and, more, as a “modern mistake” when every dictionary I look it up in says that nauseous has carried both means (“to feel sick” and “to make sick”) since 1600-1610.
One dictionary I found says “careful writers will use nauseated for the feeling of queasiness and reserve nauseous for “sickening to contemplate.” I’m okay with being careful, really I am, but I’m still unsure why grammarians are saying that using its original meaning is “a mistake of the moderns.” It is, in fact, the first definition of the word in the OED.
So. Calling all grammarians! 😉 If you learned it this way and could point me to a source (not just an expert like the wonderful Grammar Girl, mind you) that states this as fact (maybe CMS has settled the question at some point??), I would be very grateful. I don’t mind changing my ways to be a “careful” writer–but I’m a Johnnie. I don’t ever accept an expert’s opinion without checking out their sources. 😉
by Roseanna White | Oct 8, 2012 | Word of the Week
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| Lesbia Weeping over a Sparrow by Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema, 1866 |
Depression. Which is what I would be in right now after the failure of my primary coffee pot if I did not have a French press to serve as backup . . . 😉
Naw, seriously, this is another word I had to look up for my work-in-progress. See, I’ve learned to be careful about any word or phrase that is used in modern psychology, because many of them are either plain ol’ new or with new meaning since Freud and company came along, but so much in today’s common vernacular that we often don’t even pause to consider them… So I thought depression had better be investigated.
Apparently the first appearance of the word was in the 14th century, as a term in astronomy. I admit I had to look this one up, because I couldn’t fathom, on this Monday morning with belated coffee, why in the universe astronomy would employ this word. Until I saw the phrase “the sun at an angle of depression…” Ah. Angles. Right. Moving on.
Pretty much all connotations of depression stem from the literal “pressing down” of something, though that above sense pre-dates the literal meaning by 300 years. Go figure! For that matter, even the most familiar “dejection” is from the 15th century, so pre-dates the literal.
Of course, do keep in mind that when older texts (or historical fiction, LOL) refer to someone experiencing depression, this is merely a description of low spirits, not a clinical term. The clinical term didn’t come about until 1905.
But we also have a few more meanings that come from those in-between years. In 1826, depression was applied to “a reduction in economic activity.” And then in 1881 the meteorological meaning joined the team in reference to barometric pressure. Talk about a word with meanings in every sphere! The celestial one, the atmospheric one, through our wallets and all the way to our spirits.
Interesting indeed!
Hope everyone has a lovely October week full of no depression other than the atmospheric and celestial types. 😉
by Roseanna White | Oct 1, 2012 | Word of the Week
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| Palermo: Fishing Net in Mondello by Dedda71 |
When one is writing a series about a secret espionage organization, one frequently finds oneself using modern words to describe this group. And then one must constantly check oneself and go, “Aw, man! That wasn’t around yet!”
One such word is network. Though historians will use the word network to describe the widespread Culper Ring, they certainly wouldn’t have used it themselves. It’s been a word since the 1500s, don’t get me wrong–a word that meant “net-like arrangement of thread or wires.” So you could have a network of string tangled around your feet. A network of rope with which to catch fish. And . . . yeah, that was pretty much it. 😉
By 1839, the word saw it’s first expansion and was applied to any inter-locking system. Like railways, canals, roads. From there the word traveled with us into the radio age and got applied to “a broadcasting system of multiple transmitters.” And then, finally, in 1947 that was taken a step further to a group of people who are connected.
Yeah, definitely not using that one in The Culper Series.
I hope everyone enjoys their first day of October! This signals the busiest month of my year . . . and of course, it’s the month I intend to finish
Whispers from the Shadows, which will require another 40-50,000 words written. So feel free to say a prayer for me as I balance writing time with family fun every weekend.
by Roseanna White | Sep 17, 2012 | Word of the Week
I was actually reading this weekend (oooo…ahhhh), and oh-so-enjoying losing myself in the pages of a fine historical. A fine historical that at one point made me pause when these 1866 characters used the word sketchy.
Insert Roseanna narrowing her eyes and scratching her head. And being word-nerd enough to pause and go, “Really? I trust this author and publisher, but…really?”
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| Da Vinci, Head of a Woman sketch |
So naturally I had to look it up. =)
And indeed,
sketchy was a word by then. By, in fact, 1805. At which point it had a literal meaning of “sketch + y” says
www.etymonline.com. Which made me scratch my head again, because I’ve honestly never heard it used in a literal sense. So I hop over to
dictionary.com to see what
that is and discover it means (duh) “like a sketch, giving only outlines or essentials.” Which…yeah, okay. From which came the meaning of “imperfect or incomplete.” But
that sense didn’t emerge until 1878.
Not sure when the informal, slang meaning of “disreputable / shady” joined the family, but that one, I’m pretty sure is more modern. And how I usually hear it used. 😉
Hope everyone had a great weekend! I’m happy to report that I’ve finished going over my galleys for
Ring of Secrets and am ready to send the manuscript home to Harvest House today. =) Quite a relief, as now I can focus on preparing for conference. Woot!
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Roseanna M. White is a bestselling, Christy Award winning author who has long claimed that words are the air she breathes. When not writing fiction, she’s homeschooling her two kids, editing, designing book covers, and pretending her house will clean itself. Roseanna is the author of a slew of historical novels that span several continents and thousands of years. Spies and war and mayhem always seem to find their way into her books…to offset her real life, which is blessedly ordinary.