An Outline of English Speech-craft

Impertinent. Meddlesome, unbyholding.

Inarticulate. Unbreathpenned.

Incandescent. White-hot, heat-whitened.

Inceptive (verbs). Belonging to ontaking or beginning. Becomesome time-words; as, L. albesco, to become white; English whiten, to become or make white. In Greek the ending of the becomesome words is -iz or -z. Orphanízo, to make or become elderless, or an orphan.

Indefinite. L. in, un; finio, to offmark, outmark. Unoffmarked, unbounded.

Indicative (mood). The surehood mood.

Infinitive (mood). L. in, un; finitus, bounded, marked. The unboundsome thing-free mood of a time-word free of anything; as, to love, to see.

Initial. Word-head.

Injury. Injuria is a moral wrong (summum jus summa injuria). Do we not wrest its meaning in such wording as ‘The wind has done much injury to my house-roof’ or ‘injured my flowers’? How can the behaviour of the wind be made out to be a moral wrong, even if it be a hurt?

Instrumentive, instrumental (case). The tool-case or means-case, that of the tool or means of a deed; as, ‘He cut the wood with a knife.’

Interest (of money). Money-rent, loan-meed, loan-pay.

Interest. Care: – ‘I do not take any interest in him or it.’ ‘I do not becare him or it.’ ‘Wha kara unsis?’ (what care to us) (Mœso-goth). – Matt. xxvii. 4.

What a word to be taken as a thing-name is interest, ‘it is of odds’! The folk-speech, ‘It is of no odds to me,’ gives the meaning of ‘meâ non interest.’

Intransitive. Not overgoing, as time-takings that do not reach forth to another thing; as, to sleep.

Inversion. L. inverto, to turn up. An end-shifting: – ‘Thee at morn, and Thee I praise at night,’ for ‘I praise Thee at morn, and Thee at night.’ A shifting of the ends of a wording.

Irony. Gr. eirōneia, from eiron, a shammer. A good wording for a bad meaning, mock-praise; as, ‘That was a good shot,’ meaning a very bad one. ‘He is a nice man,’ meaning the reverse of nice. ‘How glorious was the king of Israel to-day!’ meaning how inglorious.

-ism. The stump -ism of the Greek -ismos seems to be used very loosely. -ismos is from the ending -izō of ontaking or inceptive time-words, and where there is no time-word ending in -izō there is not, I should think, any thing-name in -ismos; as, chloros, green; chlorizō, to become green; chlorismos, a becoming green. So, if liberalism is a becoming liberal, conservatism is a becoming conservat, which might seem to mean conservatus, one conserved, rather than a conserver. Is chartism a becoming a chart? and what is Londonism, a becoming London or a Londoning? and, if so, what is a Londoning?

We have for -ismos some English endings, as -ening, in blackening; besides -hood, -ship, and -ness, and many others of sundry kinds.

For -ism, taken in names bestowed with very slight praise, we may take -ishness; as, Hebraism, Hebrewishness; Grecism, Greekishness; Latinism, Latinishness; Londonism, Londonishness; solœcism, folkswording. (On ‘Solœcism,’ see Aul. Gell. v. 20.)

Iterative. Going over again and again. Iterative time-words, that mean to take many shorter times in time-takings of the same kind; as, to chatter, chat much; clamber, wander.

Labial (letter). L. labium, lip. A lip breath-penning.

Laxative. Loosensome.

Lecture. A lore-speech.

Lenis. L. soft. The soft breathing is an unaspirate one, such as a in and, not ha in hand.

Letter. L. litera; Sax. bóc-staf, a book-staff. It is bad that the same word letter should be used for a letter of the alphabet and an epistle, the old English word for which is a brief, as it is in German and West Friesic. It was also the name of the king’s letter for gathering of help-money in the church; though now it is the name only of a barrister’s letter of instruction.

Lingual. L. lingua, the tongue. Belonging to the tongue.

Literature. Book-lore.

Lithography. Stone-printing.

Locative (case). L. locus, stead, place. The stead or stow-case; as, ‘In London,’ ‘At church.’

Logic. Redelore.

-m, – om, – um. A word-ending, a form of the Greek one -ma, as in prag-ma, from prasso; and of the Latin -men, as in flu-men, from fluo. Words so ended meant mostly the outcome of the time-word, and were at first thing-names; and so as time-words they were, as most of them yet are, weak ones. From roots ending, I believe, in -ing came5

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Machine. An old English word for a machine is ginny or jinny which seems to be a fellow-stem to gin, and to mean to go, not as in onfaring (locomotion), but as in the way of a machine.

Magnificent. High-deedy, high-doing.

Magniloquent. High-talking.

Mechanics. Matter-might.

Metalepsis. Gr. metalambano, to take over. A use-shifting of a word, a taking of a word over from its common to another meaning; as, ‘Seven harvests ago’ for ‘seven summers or years.’

Metaphor. Gr. metaphora, from metaphero to carry over. A figure of speech, the overcarrying of a name from a thing to which it belongs to another to which it does not belong; as, ‘The Shepherd of Israel’ for ‘the Lord.’ ‘The father of the people’ for ‘a good king.’ ‘Eos Cymru’ (the Welsh nightingale) for ‘a fine Welsh songstress.’ ‘A man burning with anger.’

Metathesis. Gr. meta, with or against; thesis, a putting. A penning-shift, as that of putting each of two pennings in the stead of the other; as, waps, wasp; haps; hasp; though the first of the two shapes is the older in English.

Metathesis is where a wordShifts pennings, as in crud for curd.

Meteor. Welkin-fire.

Metonymy. Gr. meta, off; onoma, a name. An offnaming, name-shifting, a wording that puts for a thing-name the name of some belonging – whether cause or effect or aught else – of the thing; as, ‘He reads Horace’ for ‘his works.’ ‘He lives by the sweat of his brow’ for ‘work.’ ‘Land holden by the Crown’ (Queen). ‘The power of the pen’ for ‘writers.’

Miosis. Gr. meiōsis, a forlessening. A wording by which a thing is lessened off; as, ‘Will you give me a crumb of bread and a drop of drink?’

Miōsis, a lessening,Makes of a great a smaller thing.

Monitor. A warner. Ware-en-er, who makes ware.

Monosyllable. A breath-sound.

Multiloquous. Wordy, talksome.

Negative (word). L. nego, to deny. Fornaysome.

Nomenclature. Benaming, name-shapening.

Nominative. L. nomen, a, name. The name-case, speech-case.

Noun. L. nomen, a name; Fr. nom. A thing-name, thing-word, name-word.

Objective. Objective case. A name commonly given to the time-giving thing when it is not the speech-case.

Onomatopœia. A mocking name. The making of words from sounds; as, to hiss, a peewit or cuckoo from the sound it makes.

Optative (mood). The wish mood; as, ‘Oh! that I had wings.’ ‘May you be happy.’

Out- (a fore-eking). Outban, exile; outfaring, peregrination, exodus; outhue, outliken, depict or draw.

Over- (a fore-eking). Overbold, audacious; overhang, impend; overweigh, preponderate.

-p, -b, -f (endings). They mean small in kind or short in time: – Poke, pop, poke quickly; dip, a small dive; slip, a small slide; rip, to rive quickly.

Palindrome. Gr. palin, back; dromos, a running. A set of words which read the same backwards as forwards; as, ‘Lewd did I live, evil I did dwel,’ or ‘Roma tibi subito motibus ibit amor.’

A palindrome’s the same as readFrom head to tail, or tail to head.

Palpitate. Throb.

Panacea. Allheal.

Paradigm. Gr. paradeigma, an offshowing, outshowing, a plan. A table of word-shapes.

Paragogē. An outbringing or outlengthening of a word.

A paragogē will be foundWhere words are lengthened by a sound.‘Such a sweet pett as thisIs neither far nor neary.Here we go up, up, up;Here we go down, down, downy.Here we go backwards and forwards,And here we go round, round, roundy.’Old Song‘In playhouses, full six-o,One knows not where to fix-o.’Old Song

Paragraph. An offwriting, a wording-share; such a share of a piece of writing as, if it were offwritten, would not want anything of a full meaning.

Paraphrase. New bewording; a turning of a piece of writing into other words, often more if not clearer than those of the writer. A paraphrase, while it is meant to clearen, may falsen the paraphrased matter. The following paraphrase from an old written sermon of (as I believe) an old Dorset divine, may be a good sample of new bewording: —

‘God, I thank Thee, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this Publican: I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess.’

Expanded or paraphrased: —

‘With great gratitude, O God (said the Pharisee), I contemplate my own superior attainments. How free is my mind from a variety of black offences which invade the consciences of others! Extortion, injustice, and adultery are crimes (said he, striking his breast) which have no harbour here. Who can lay to my charge the neglect of any religious duty? Are not my tithes paid with cheerfulness, and my fasts observed with sanctity?’

‘And the Publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner.’

‘The Publican, on the other hand, with every mark of the deepest contrition, stood abashed in a corner of the temple. Conscious of his own demerits, he was afraid to raise his eyes to that Being who sees the least degree of impurity with offence. After many ineffectual struggles to form the sighing of a contrite heart into the language of prayer, his efforts ended in this one exclamation, God be merciful to me a sinner.’

Parenthesis. An inwedging of a sentence within another: – ‘Thou sayest – but they are but vain words – I have strength for the war.’

Parody. A song-mocking.

Paronomasia. A kind of play on words of more or less like sound, though of sundry meaning; as, ‘Though last not least.’ ‘Non amissi sed præmissi’ (said of friends deceased), ‘Not forgone but foregone.’

Paronomasia is foundIn pairs of words of some like sound.

Participle. A thing-marking shape of the time-word.

Particle. A wordling, a small shapefast word.

Patronymic. Gr. pater, father, and onoma, name. A surname or sirename of a man taken from the forename of his father; as, John Richardson, Dafydd Ap-hoel, Patrick Mac-Duff, Jeroboam Ben-Nebat.

Pedigree. Kin-stem, forekin-stem.

Penultimate. Last but one.

Perambulator (the child’s carriage). Push-wainling.

Perfect. Fordone, forended, full-ended.

Period, in rhetoric (redecraft) and speechcraft, is so called, as a speech-ring or speech-round, a full round of thought-wording, in which the speech-meaning is kept uphanging and more or less unclear, till the last word or word-cluster by which it is clearly fulfilled; as, ‘(1) That among the sundry changes of the world (2), (3) our hearts may surely there be fixed (4): (5) where true joys are to be found (6).’ The whole thought-wording is a period or speech-round. From (1) to (4) is a limb (called in Greek a kōlon) and has a meaning, though not a full one beyond which the mind awaits nothing more. The word-cluster from (1) to (2) yields no full meaning, and is called in Greek a komma (kopma), a cutting or shareling. Thence we see the source of the names and uses of the stops – the period (.), colon (:), comma (,). The period marked the end of the period; the colon that of the kolon; and the comma that of a comma, or cutting of a colon.

The word seems to be often misused. A period (Gr. periodos) of time or wording is rightly a running of it round again to its like beginning; as, a week – from Sunday round to Sunday; or a year – from January to January.

A straight stretch of time or words is not truly a period; as, a man’s life from birth to manhood is not a ring-gate, beginning anew at childhood.

Periphrasis. Gr. peri, round; phrasis, a speaking. A roundabout speaking of a thing instead of an outright naming of it, a name-hinting; as, ‘The gentleman at the head of Her Majesty’s Government’ for Lord B.

Personal (time-word); not an impersonal one; as, ‘It rains.’ ‘It snows;’ but one with a named time-taker, as ‘John rides.’

Perverse. Wayward, froward.

Pervious. Throughletting.

Petrify. To stonen, forstonen.

Philology. Speechlore.

Phonetic. Soundly.

Phonography, phonotypy. Sound-spelling. Surely a photograph should be a phototype. Graphō is to graze or grave along a body, but a photograph is given by a plumb downstriking of rays of light – a typē and not a graphē. With graphē and typē we may set a glyphē (from glyphō), an outsmoothing of a shape, as that of a figure from a block of stone. Glyphō is a fellow stem-word to glykys, smooth, soft, or sweet.

Phrase. Gr. phrazo, to speak, say. A word-cluster, a word-set, a cluster or set of byhanging words.

Pirate. Sea-robber, weeking, wyking, wicing (Gloss. 11 cent.). The wicings or weekings or vicings were so called as lurking about in the bays, wicas, weeks, wykes, or wiches.

Plagiary. A thought-pilferer.

Pleonasm. Gr. pleonazo, to fullen or overfullen. An overwording; as, ‘A great [thing of a] boar’ for ‘a great boar.’ ‘What [ever in the world] are you doing?’ ‘Never [in all my whole life] have I seen the like.’

A pleonasm oft is heardTo strengthen speech by word on word.

Plocē. Gr. plokē, a twining or folding. A twining or folding of a foregiven name, of one meaning the same name, in another; as, ‘Then Edwin was Edwin (or himself) again.’ Worthy of himself. ‘Coal is now coal,’ i. e. scarce and costly.

By plocē you inweave a nameOnce more with meaning not the same.

Plural (number). The somely (number).

Polyptoton. Gr. poly, many; ptotos, case. The inbringing of fellow stem-words or root-words in sundry cases or ways: – ‘He, friendless once, befriended friends.’

Posterity. Afterkin.

Postposition. A hinder case-word, a case-word put after the thing-name; as, in Hindustani, panee-main, water in; panee-sae, water from; panee-ko, water to. Showing the source of case-endings.

Potential (mood). L. potentia, might, power. Mayly.

Predicate. The wording of the time-taking; as, ‘John walked twenty miles.’

Prefix. A fore-eking, a forewordling; as, be-set, for-give, out-run.

Preposition. A case-word.

Preterite. Bygone, past.

Programme. A foredraught.

Pronoun (personal). A name-token, a stead-word. Pronoun Adjective, mark-word.

Proper name. A one-head name.

Prosopopœia. Gr. prosopon, face, person; poieo, to make. The putting of an unmatterly or impersonal thing as a person.

Prosopopœia shows your mindUnlive things doing as mankind.

Protasis. The hinge time-taking.

Prototype. Foreshape, forepattern.

Punctuation. L. punctuatio, from puncta, points or stops. The skill of the putting of stops, or of the marking of voice-stoppings in speech. Bestopping. (See ‘Period.’)

Radicle. Rootling.

Reciprocal (verb). L. re, back, fro; ci, to this way. To and fro verbs; as, ‘They helped each other.’

Rectify. Righten.

Reflective. Back-turning, as a time-taking which comes back to the source of it; as, ‘John cut or hit himself.’

Regimen. Government, overwielding of a thing by another.

Religion. Faith-law.

Religious. On the true meaning of religiosus see Aul. Gell. Noct. Att. iv. 9. He makes it mean withholden, backbound from some uses. Religiosa delubra, a shrine hallowed from common use; religiosus dies, a day withholden, as unlucky, from great undertakings. A religious man is one who is withholden by his faith and conscience from bad deeds.

Restrain. Inhold, forhold.

Result. Outcome, outworking, backspring. Result (from resilio, to spring back) is neither in sound nor meaning a better word than outcome or outworking or froming, fromming.

Rhetoric. Rede-speech.

Rhythm. Gr. rhythmos, number, as number of clippings or sounds in a line of verse. Metre, which meant at first tale of sounds rather than sound matching, which we call rime. Rime is not come to us from the Greek, but is the Saxon rim or hrim, tale or number.

‘Manâ and misdædâ ungerím ealrâ’ (a tale, beyond telling, of all wickednesses and misdeeds). —Sermo Lupi ad Anglos.

‘Deer naet in da rime was’ (who was not in the number). —Old Friesic Law.

Salubrious. Healthy, halesome.

Satellite. Henchman.

Scintillate. Sparkle.

Semi-detached houses. Twin-houses, a house-twin.

Sentence. L. sentio, to think, deem, feel. In speech-craft, an uttering of a thought, one thought-wording.

Septuple. Sevenfold.

-sh (an ending). It means quickness and smartness; as, clang, clash; crack, crash; fly, flash; go, gush; hack, hash. In markwords it means somewhat such; —blackish, boyish.

-ship (an ending). It means a shape or form of being: —Friendship, mateship.

Solœcisms. Gr. soloikismos, from the bad Greek of the Soloikoi in Cilicia. A miswording, barbarism, or, as an old Saxon gives it, ‘a miscweðen word,’ or a misquothing, a misqueathing.

We in a solœcismus findMiswording of a loreless mind.

Solstice. Sunsted. A.S. Sunanstede.

-some. The ending -some in such words as aimsome, matchsome, yieldsome seems, as we look to its true first meaning, to be a fitting one. A sam or som (some) meant at first a body of mingled matter or things. In its stronger meaning lumps of suet melted up into a soft body would be a sam or som; and potatoes boiled and mashed up would be a sam; and dough, if not flour itself, is a sam or som.

In the wider meaning of the word an upgathering of things, and even men, into a body or set is a sam or som. Thence we have our word same as well as the ending -some and the markword some: – ‘Some in rags, and some in jags, and some in silken gowns’ (a set or body in rags, a set or body in jags, &c.).

Aimsome, yieldsome would mean of the aim or yield or aiming or yielding set or body.

Sam or som gives our words same and so. ‘The same man’ means the very man in sam or body or being. ‘Are they Hebrews? so (same) am I.’ Of that sam (am I). The Latin se is most likely a word of the same root: – ‘Lucius se amat’ (Lucius loves same or his sam); and this is the meaning of our word self.

The Latin similis would mean of the sam or same kind; and ‘to summon (samen) men’ is to call them up into a sam, ‘Suma êlanda thêr im likte’ (some islands that pleased him). —Oera Linda Book.

Sophist. Wordwise.

Sophistry. Rede-guile, rede-cunning.

Spell. Sax. spellian, to tell, utter forth a word or a set of words.

Spell. A message or bewording, as in Godspel (Gospel), ‘the good message.’

-st (an ending). It strengthens the meaning, as it does in blackest; blow, blast; brow, breast.

Stereography. Bulk-drawing.

Stereometry. Bulk-meting.

Stereotype. Block-type.

Subject. The speech-thing or thing under speech.

Subjunctive (mood). The hinge-mood; as, ‘If ye ask, ye shall receive.’

Suffix. A wordling put on at the end of a word; as, man-hood, good-ness, kind-ly. End-eking, an on-eking, a word-ending.

Superlative. The highest pitch.

Supposititious. Underfoisted, undersmuggled.

Syllepsis. Gr. syn, up, together; lēpsis, a taking. An uptaking, upmating, comprehension, as of a second or third person with a first; as, ‘I (1) and my brother (3) (we) learn Latin.’.

Syllepsis takes I, you, and heAs first persons, and all called we.

Synalœpha. Gr. syn, up; aleipho, to smear. Sound-welding. The welding up of two sounds into one, or the end of one word into the head of the following. In Latin verse – ‘Conticuere omnes,’ ‘conticue͞r omnes,’ ‘conticuere◡omnes’ – uttering the e and om in the time of one syllable. So in Italian – ‘In prato◡in foresta,’ ‘Sia l’alba◡o la sera,’ ‘Se dorme◡il pastor’ – the o i, and a o, and e i are uttered as one syllable. In English – ‘Before the◡Almighty’s throne.’