The Romance of Words Part 21

Cotgrave has _flans_, "flawnes, custards, eggepies; also, round planchets, or plates of metall."

CHAPTER X

DOUBLETS

The largest cla.s.s of doublets is formed by those words of Latin origin which have been introduced into the language in two forms, the popular form through Anglo-Saxon or Old French, 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 Anglo-Sax. _disc_, whence Eng. _dish_. In Old French it became _deis_ (_dais_), Eng. _dais_, and in Ital. _desco_, "a deske, a table, a boord, a counting boord" (Florio), whence our _desk_. We have also the learned _disc_ or _disk_, so that the one Latin word has supplied us with four vocables, differentiated in meaning, but each having the fundamental sense of a flat surface.

_Dainty_, from Old Fr. _deintie_, is a doublet of _dignity_. _Ague_ is properly an adjective equivalent to _acute_, as in Fr. _fievre aigue_.

The _paladins_ were the twelve peers of Charlemagne's _palace_, and a Count _Palatine_ is a later name for something of the same kind. One of the most famous bearers of the t.i.tle, 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 fact that a three-legged stool stands firm on any surface. In the learned doublets _tripod_ and _tripos_ we have the Greek form. _Spice_, Old Fr. _espice_ (_epice_), is a doublet of _species_. The medieval merchants recognised four "kinds" of spice, viz., saffron, cloves, cinnamon, nutmegs.

_Coffin_ is the learned doublet of _coffer_, Fr. _coffre_, from Lat.

_cophinus_. It was originally used of a basket or case of any kind, and even of a pie-crust--

"Why, thou say'st true; it is a paltry cap; A custard-_coffin_, a bauble, a silken pie."

(_Taming of the Shrew_, iv. 3.)

Its present meaning is an attempt at avoiding the mention of the inevitable, a natural human weakness which has popularised in America the horrible word _casket_ in this sense. The Greeks, fearing death less than do the moderns, called a coffin plainly sa???f????, flesh-eater, whence indirectly Fr. _cercueil_ and Ger. _Sarg_.

The homely _mangle_, which comes to us from Dutch, is a doublet of the warlike engine called a _mangonel_--

"You may win the wall in spite both of bow and _mangonel_."

(_Ivanhoe_, Ch. 27.)

which is Old French. The source is Greco-Lat. _manganum_, apparatus, whence Ital. _mangano_, with both meanings. The verb _mangle_, to mutilate, is unrelated.

[Page Heading: SULLEN--MONEY]

_Sullen_, earlier _soleyn_, is a popular doublet of _solemn_, in its secondary meaning of glum or morose. In the early Latin-English dictionaries _solemn_, _soleyn_, and _sullen_ are used indifferently to explain such words as _acerbus_, _agelastus_, _vultuosus_. Shakespeare speaks of "customary suits of _solemn_ black" (_Hamlet_, i. 2), but makes Bolingbroke say--

"Come, mourn with me for that I do lament, And put on _sullen_ black incontinent."

(_Richard II._, v. 6.)

while the "_solemn_ curfew" (_Tempest_, v. 1) is described by Milton as "swinging slow with _sullen_ roar" (_Penseroso_, l. 76). The meaning of _antic_, a doublet 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 was applied to grotesque[102] work in art or to a fantastic disguise. Then it came to mean buffoon, in which sense Shakespeare applies it to grim death--

"For within the hollow crown That rounds the mortal temples of a king, Keeps death his court; and there the _antic_ sits, Scoffing his state, and grinning at his pomp."

(_Richard II._, iii. 2.)

and lastly the meaning was transferred to the capers of the buffoon.

From Old High Ger. _faltan_ (_falten_), to fold, and _stuol_ (_Stuhl_), chair, we get Fr. _fauteuil_. Medieval Latin constructed the compound _faldestolium_, whence our ecclesiastical _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 development, from a riotous concourse to a festive gathering, has perhaps been affected by Fr. _reveiller_, to wake, whence _reveillon_, a Christmas Eve supper, or "wake." Cf. Ital. _vegghia_, "a watch, a wake, a _revelling a nights_"

(Florio).

The very important word _money_ has acquired its meaning by one of those accidents which are so common in word-history. The Roman _mint_ was attached to the temple of Juno _Moneta_, _i.e._, the admonisher, from _monere_, and this name was transferred to the building. The Romans introduced _moneta_, in the course of their conquests, into French (_monnaie_), German (_Munze_), 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. silver. The Ger. _Geld_, money, has no connection with _gold_, but is cognate with Eng. _yield_, as in "the _yield_ of an investment," of which we preserve the old form in _wergild_, payment for having killed a man (Anglo-Sax. _wer_). To return to _moneta_, we have a third form of the word in _moidore_--

"And fair rose-n.o.bles and broad _moidores_ The waiter pulls out of their pockets by scores."

(INGOLDSBY, _The Hand of Glory_.)

from Port. _moeda de ouro_, money of gold.

Sometimes the same word reaches us through different languages. Thus _charge_ is French and _cargo_ is Spanish, both belonging to a Vulgar Lat. _*carricare_ from _carrus_, vehicle. In old commercial records we often find the Anglo-Norman form _cark_, a load, burden, which survives now only in a metaphorical sense, e.g. _carking_, _i.e._ burdensome, care. Lat. _domina_ has given us through French both _dame_ and _dam_,[103] and through Spanish _duenna_; while Ital. _donna_ occurs in the compound _madonna_ and the _donah_ of the East End costermonger.

Lat. _datum_, given, becomes Fr. _de_ 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 the old Italian comedy, which still exists as the harlequinade of the Christmas pantomime, and of which some traces survive in the Punch and Judy show. He was represented as a cowardly braggart dressed in black. The golfer's _stance_ is a doublet of the poet's _stanza_, both of them belonging to Lat. _stare_, to stand.

_Stance_ is Old French and _stanza_ is Italian, "a _stance_ or staffe of verses or songs" (Florio). A _stanza_ is then properly a pause or resting place, just as a _verse_, Lat. _versus_, is a "turning" to the beginning of the next line.

[Page Heading: FROM FRENCH DIALECTS]

Different French dialects have supplied us with many doublets. Old Fr.

_chacier_ (_cha.s.ser_), Vulgar Lat. _*captiare_, for _captare_, a frequentative of _capere_, to take, was in Picard _cachier_. This has given Eng. _catch_, which is thus a doublet of _chase_. In _cater_ (see p. 63) we have the Picard form of Fr. _acheter_, but the true French form survives in the family name _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 meaning of _cattle_ is paralleled by Scot. _avers_, farm beasts, from Old Fr. _aver_[105]

(_avoir_), property, goods. The history of the word _fee_, Anglo-Sax.

_feoh_, cattle, cognate with Lat. _pecus_, whence _pecunia_, money, also takes us back to the times when a man's wealth was estimated by his flocks and herds; but, in this case, the sense development is exactly reversed.

Fr. _jumeau_, twin, was earlier _gemeau_, still used by Corneille, and earlier still _gemel_, Lat. _gemellus_, diminutive of _geminus_, twin.

From one form we have the _gimbals_, or twin pivots, which keep the compa.s.s horizontal. Shakespeare uses it of clockwork--

"I think, by some odd _gimmals_, or device, Their arms are set like clocks, still to strike on."

(1 _Henry VI._, i. 2.)

and also speaks of a _gimmal_ bit (_Henry V._, iv. 2). In the 17th century we find numerous allusions to _gimmal_ rings (variously spelt).

The toothsome _jumble_, known to the Midlands as "brandy-snap," is the same word, this delicacy having apparently at one time been made in links. We may compare the obsolete Ital. _stortelli_, lit. "little twists," explained by Torriano as "winding simnels, wreathed _jumbals_."

An accident of spelling may disguise the origin and meaning of a word.

_Tret_ is Fr. _trait_, in Old French also _tret_, Lat. _tractus_, pull (of 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 the scale" which would be in the purchaser's favour if the goods were weighed in small quant.i.ties. _Trait_ is still so used in modern French.

[Page Heading: METTLE--GLAMOUR]

A difference in spelling, originally accidental, but perpetuated by an apparent difference of meaning, is seen in _flour_, _flower_; _metal_, _mettle_. _Flour_ is the _flower_, _i.e._ the finest part, of meal, Fr.

_fleur de farine_, "_flower_, or the finest meale" (Cotgrave). In the _Nottingham Guardian_ (29th Aug. 1911) I read that--

"Mrs Kernahan is among the increasing number of persons who do not discriminate between _metal_ and _mettle_, and writes 'Margaret was on her _metal_.'"

It might be added that this author is in the excellent company of Shakespeare--

"See whe'r their basest _metal_ be not mov'd."

(_Julius Caesar_, i. 1.)

There is no more etymological difference between _metal_ and _mettle_ than between the "temper" of a cook and that of a sword-blade.

_Parson_ is a doublet of _person_, the priest perhaps being taken as "representing" the Church, for Lat. _persona_, an actor's mask, from _per_, through, and _sonare_, to sound,[106] was also used of a costumed character or _dramatis persona_. _Mask_, which ultimately belongs to an Arabic word meaning buffoon, has had a sense development exactly opposite to that of _person_, its modern meaning corresponding to the Lat. _persona_ from which the latter started. _Parson_ shows the popular p.r.o.nunciation 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 the speller," or the phonetic theories of the old parish clerk, are often more in accordance with the p.r.o.nunciation, _e.g._, _Barclay_, _Clark_, _Darby_, _Sargent_, _Marchant_. _Posy_, in both its senses, is a contraction of _poesy_, the flowers of a nosegay expressing by their arrangement a sentiment like that engraved on a ring. The latter use is perhaps obsolete--

"A hoop of gold, a paltry ring That she did give me; whose _posy_ was For all the world like cutler's _poetry_ Upon a knife: 'Love me and leave me not.'"

(_Merchant of Venice_, v. 1.)

The poetic word _glamour_ is the same as _grammar_, which had in the Middle Ages the sense of mysterious learning. From the same source we have the French corruption _grimoire_, "a booke of conjuring"