by Roseanna White | Apr 24, 2017 | Word of the Week
Not happy inspiration here, as I thought to wonder about the word as I was typing it into a description of what happened to my computer for the second time in a week–thoroughly and completely went kaput on me [grumble, grumble, growl, growl].
But the word itself is rather interesting!
It traces its first appearance in English back to the 1890s but really entered common usage during WWI–it being taken from the German kaputt. (I had no idea it was that old.) It means “to utterly ruin or destroy,” and it’s said that in the early days of the war and German victories, “everything enemy was kaput.”
The German word, however, is actually presumed to be borrowed from the French. As early as the 1640s, the Germans took the French phrase faire capot–taking all the tricks in a card game–and flipped it, so that it reflected the negative rather than the positive side of winning/losing so completely.
So all in all, a very interesting word. And a terrible thing to happen to one’s computer. 😉
Don’t forget that tonight is my last Facebook chat on the Ladies of the Manor Series! I’ll be taking next week off while on my writing retreat, then pick up again May 8.
by Roseanna White | Apr 17, 2017 | Word of the Week
Perhaps it’s no surprise on the Monday following Holy Week that forsake has come up–I daresay many of us heard again in the last few days Jesus’ lament upon the cross. It was some silly wordplay, however, that made me wonder as to the word’s etymology. Yesterday in the car, I said something about “For your sake” to my husband, and he replied with “You’re forsaking me?” with an exaggerated pout.
First time I’d ever really paid attention to the two parts of that word! So this being me, I immediately wondered if they’re from the same root.
The amazing part being that I remembered to look it up this morning. 😉
So first off, forsake and sake are indeed from the same word. Both are present in Old English, and probably came from Norse, as there are similar words in other Nordic languages. Sake has always meant “purpose,” the original form being sacu. It was actually originally applied to a legal cause or case. So to say “for someone’s sake” would mean for their cause, for their case. (Interestingly that phrase is pretty much the only one in which the word has been preserved.) But it would also take on the other side of the legal coin and mean “accusation, blame, dispute.”
Forsake then combines that opposition sense of sake with Old English for-, which meant “completely.” Forsacan, the Old English word, literally meant “to object to, deny, refuse, give up, renounce.” At some point in time it came to be used not just in a legal sense, but in relation to those who have turned their back on something to which they ought to be loyal.
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Don’t forget that tonight is my second Facebook Live event, at 7 p.m. eastern! I’ll be chatting about The Reluctant Duchess, answering your questions, and reading a snippet. I’ll be starting with one of last week’s questions about my favorite authors too. =) Hope to see you there, either live or afterward!
by Roseanna White | Mar 27, 2017 | Word of the Week
As a mom of primary/middle schoolers, cursive writing is a part of our day. But as my kiddos were being their usual snarky selves last week (I’ve raised them well, what can I say), the question arose of why certain letters look the way they do in cursive. Because yes, my kids question everything. Even things as innocuous as a Z. I choose to view that as a good thing, LOL. 😉
But Xoe then insisted that I look it up today for my word of the week. So here we go!
The word itself, cursive, comes from the Italian corsivo, which means “running.” The entire purpose of it is to allow speed in writing, especially in the days of quill pens, which are fragile and finicky compared to the pens we use today. With that in mind, it’s no surprise that cursive writing has been around for thousands of years. The word, however, has only been in English since 1784. Previously it had been called “joining-hand.”
Though most languages and alphabets have a form of cursive, I’ll focus on the English version. Apparently there was no standardization in the early days, with two predominant styles: what we’d call italic, with no loops for ascenders and descenders, and looped, where things like p and d have a loop to allow for easy flow into the next letter. By the 16th century cursive had come to look more or less like what we recognize today. Styles still varied here and there, and everyone didn’t always connect every letter, but standardization was probably helped along by businesses employing trained clerks to write in “fair hand” (easily readable script) for all their correspondence.
In more recent years, a few different techniques have arisen, which vary the method of learning to write the letters, but the letters themselves still end up looking largely the same. And of course, then we all leave school and write however we please anyway. 😉
Do you have opinions on cursive handwriting? Do you use it in your own handwriting?
by Roseanna White | Mar 20, 2017 | Word of the Week
This might seem like an odd word of the week until you consider I’m a writer, LOL. One who, as it happens, is indeed brainstorming a plot that involves a kidnapping.
And yet, I actually read about this word from pure happenstance. 😉 Go figure!
Anyway. It’s kinda of interesting, so let’s take a look.
First of all, though sometimes moderns think kid, as applied to a child, is terrible slang that was never used in historical days, that’s simply not true. The word for “a young goat” since 1200, it was extended to children in the 1500s–first written record is the 1590s, but no doubt it was used it speech before that. It was slang at first, yes, but had lost that “slang” stigma by the 1840s (though it was still considered an informal word).
So then kidnap comes to us by the 1680s–part of thieves’ language. It was originally used for when they stole children to ship them to the American colonies as servants or laborers! Who knew? The kid part is therefore obvious. Nap is a variant of nab. But interesting is that kidnapper was in use at least a decade before kidnap, leading experts to believe the verb is a back-formation of the noun.
Now off I go plot out a story in which my hero kidnaps my heroine and gets way more than he bargained for, LOL.
by Roseanna White | Mar 6, 2017 | Word of the Week
Another lesson learned at Colonial Williamsburg. =) Well, I’m pretty sure I’d learned this before, but not with a nice visual handy…
So since the mid 1800s, people have referred to capital letters as upper case and small letters as lower case. This is a direct borrow from printers’ type cases, where they keep the metal letters with which they build their work. Since small letters are used far more often than capitals, these were stored more handily in the lower case. Capitals, which are used rather sparingly in comparison, were kept in the harder-to-reach upper case.
The simple names (upper and lower) for the type case have been used since the 1500s. I’m a bit surprised it took 300 years for the names to be transferred to the letters kept in the cases!
Interestingly, setting type was the job of the lowest (and generally shortest, ha ha) apprentice, so younger boys learning to be a printer might have a hard time reaching those capitals at all. (Now what’s the excuse of my 9-year-old for hating to use them when writing with a pencil? That’s another question altogether…)
by Roseanna White | Feb 27, 2017 | Word of the Week
Happy Monday from Colonial Williamsburg! It’s Homeschool Days down in CW, so my family and I are here on a 2-day pass. Yesterday we had great fun visiting many of the trade shops and enjoying the early spring weather and flowers (daffodils! In February!).
And it’s from one of these trade shops that I got the inspiration for this week’s word.
We visited the milliner and mantua maker just before lunch yesterday and had a lovely time chatting with the ladies who make the dresses and hats (I know just enough to know what questions to ask, as my hubby pointed out). One of things they showed us was an 18th century clout–the word at the time for a diaper.
As she showed us the clout, she pointed out that diaper was in fact the name for the sturdy weave of cloth they used in the clout (under the cover) originally (similar to the image I use above, though that’s just a digital pattern). Diaper signified a very tight, patterned weave that is far more absorbent, as it happens, then a normal weave. The word itself comes from Latin originally–dia meaning “thoroughly” and aspros eventually meaning “white” but first meaning something more like “textured” or “rough.”
The word began to be used to for the clout itself, rather than the pattern, by the 1830s.
I know, I know–I spent two days in Colonial Williamsburg and talk to you about diapers, LOL. Just goes to show that you never know what might impress me when it comes to words. 😉
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Don’t forget that today begins the 40 Days of Jesus Bible study! If you’re going to be reading along, start today with the first chapter of the Gospel of John.
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.