qroqqa has looked up 1942 words, created 26 lists, listed 2400 words, written 1503 comments, added 229 tags, and loved 0 words.
Comments by qroqqa
Comments for qroqqa
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Dear qroqqa,
Thank you for your comment on curry. I especially like the bit about the "mediaeval eggcorn."
Yours truly,
ruzuzu -
"qroqqa has added 24 lists containing 2,235 words, 227 comments, 227 tags, 2 favorites, and 0 pronunciations."
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We miss you and your illimitable founts of etymological wisdom!
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Would you pronounce your username?
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Thanks for your suggestion (a week and a half ago!) regarding my question about how to refer the "singular" of a pluralis tantem. I think I understand the notion of a "bound base", but I am not sure that applies to units like *scissor, *hijink, and *trouser, since the -s in the pluralis tantum is not really an affix in the way that dis- is in discombobulate, but a grammatical ending (or perhaps this distinction is irrelevant?). In other words, when we remove the ending from scissors, we still have a hypothetical noun that acts like real nouns in certain ways, notably, it can serve as a verb ("She scissored her way through the crowd") or a modifier ("The scissor pieces lay on the table, waiting to be assembled"). Would lexeme work in such cases?
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Hi, Qroqqa! I am looking for a way to refer to the hypothetical singular form of a pluralis tantem, e.g. *scissor, *underpant, *hijink. Are these lexemes? I figured that you would be the Wordie to ask about this.
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Happy New Year qroqqa, there's only us on Wordie!
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I just wanted to say that I really appreciate your citations and contributions to this site and I'm glad you're here.
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For the record, qroqqa is about the only Maltese word I know.
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Time for a cookie! Perhaps a Maltese treat for us here?
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Hi qroqqa. I'd appreciate a Maltese miaow here.
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qroqqa, thank you for your help on the braggadocio recipe. Can I just ask you to use a narrower definition of "English word"? Risotto and espresso are Italian, Morocco is a country, and Lobelia is borrowed from the scientific name.
I can't believe no wasn't there yet!
Thank you! -
Yay! You know, there is a secret subgroup of biologists here on Wordie. But it's so secret that I can't talk about it.
qroqqa commented on the word clade
The problem is that two 'definitions' found on the Internet are mutually inconsistent. That's got nothing to do with what a clade is. Clades are defined by descent; there's no actual need for any two members of a clade to share any particular inheritance. A clade is a species together with all its descendants.
Nov 21, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word niche
'Niche market', however, doesn't show what part of speech it is. It is natural to suppose 'niche' is a noun in that phrase (as in 'stock market', 'bear market'). It is the ability to be modified by adverbs that shows it has (for some people) become a noun.
Nov 14, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word head-first
According to the new reverse dictionary thingy, the definition of this word contains the word 'columbium'.
Jun 22, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word flerovium
This name was once briefly suggested for nobelium, which may be enough to scupper it with the IUPAC.
Jun 22, 2011
qroqqa commented on the list killjoy-et-al
There's at least one French/English pair of surnames: Boileau = Drinkwater. Then there are the Rabelaisian names that get translated with the same structure: Baisecul = Kissebreech. Do-nothing is a translation of the old French fainéant kings.
Jun 16, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word fickfack
What a silly word. Isn't this what we standard English speakers call the paxwax? And q.v. for alternatives: 'Also called paxywaxy, packwax, faxwax, fixfax, and whit-leather.' I bet that last one is made up.
Jun 14, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word work related upper limb disorder
Apparently another new term for RSI and its little friends.
Jun 10, 2011
qroqqa commented on the list phonestheme--cr---or-kr
There are two, surely: an abrupt one in crash, crack, crunch, crumple, crinkle and a slow one in creep, crawl. I suppose creak, crumble could partake of both.
Surprisingly, cranberry might be relatable to these after all, if its etymon crane has any kind of abrupt cry.
Jun 10, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word sertanista
[José Carlos Meirelles] is a "sertanista" – the name given to a select few people who scour the Amazon jungle is search of isolated peoples and then set up a remote outpost to monitor and protect them from contact with "civilisation".
—Al Jazeera, 24 June 2008
Jun 10, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word zero
Zero, a Word sometimes us'd especially among the French, for a Cipher or Nought (0).
—Phillips's New World of Words, 1706
Jun 8, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word candid
'Candid' does not mean "white". It comes from a Latin word meaning "white" or "candid".
Jun 2, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word kine
Actually the pronouns mine and thine do, but kine doesn't. The -ine is the Germanic form of the adjective ending more familiar from Latin-derived equine, porcine, etc. Greek also had it*; crystalline is the only English inheritance of this that I can recall.
Kine on the other hand is a double plural: first by umlaut alone, [ku:] becoming [ky:], then picking up the -n plural.
* Hm, apparently the -i- was short here, so perhaps not the same ending after all.
Jun 1, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word puerarchy
Plus archy, Latin for . . . oh, wait. So it'd be a paedarchy or tecnarchy then.
May 27, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word stupiphany
I read this on Wordnik yesterday, and didn't understand what oroboros had taken so long to tumble to. Wished oroboros had included a definition. Looked at it today . . .
May 26, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word omne trinum perfectum
Trium (genitive as in trium virorum) does seem to be an error that has crept in. Older books pretty consistently favour trinum. (Tritium in Google Books is a scanning error for italic trinum.) One source gives ternarium, which would I suppose be synonymous, as in the adverbs trini/terni. Annoyingly, Perseus is now filtered at work so I can't do the proper checking.
May 23, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word toward
I thought BrE was pretty neutral about all the other -ward(s) words, and was surprised to see how much 'forward' preponderates over 'forwards': about 10 in 1 in both Ngrams and the BNC.
Examination of the BNC shows that much of this can be put down to common constructions like 'look forward to', 'put forward' (a proposal etc.), where only the one is possible.
May 20, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word toward
The current AmE preferred form of 'towards', and has been since 1900, as illustrated strikingly on Google Ngram Viewer. Other -ward(s) words don't have anything like so dramatic a history.
In BrE it's always been very much a minor variant, but it may have started to come into regular use in recent years.
May 19, 2011
qroqqa commented on the user kretenack
Full of termites and gradually falling into the large pit next door, but you won't have to worry too long, as it's in line for compulsory acquisition for a freeway next year.
May 16, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word unsigmatic
Not sigmatic, that is not formed with sigma: said of Greek aorists and futures. In the case of aorists also called second aorist.
May 3, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word bakkushan
From English back + German schön "beautiful", weirdly compounded in Japanese. As a (supposedly) foreign word it is written in katakana.
Apr 27, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word caw
Actually Maltese ċaw, pronounced basically the same as the Italian ciao, its origin.
Apr 27, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word kappatic
Formed with a kappa, in the Greek perfect tense. Compare the sigmatic aorist and future.
Apr 1, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word species
It's not plurale tantum, as it readily occurs as both singular and plural in syntax; however, the two forms are the same, like sheep and aircraft.
This problem hadn't occurred to me before, but I agree in theory that singular species's is possible. However, we use apostrophe-only with certain singular words, such as classical names ending in multiple sibilants: Xerxes', Rameses', Jesus'. It's the difficulty of pronouncing the extra syllable that recommends the apostrophe-only, as it would in the narcissus' petals.
Mar 30, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word harrassed
None of the below. ['hærəst], with the vowel of hat, not hair.
Mar 21, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word teratonym
-onym- "name", rather
Mar 21, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word Eden
Actually the Hebrew begins with the consonant `ayin.
Mar 4, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word demolishment
No occurrences in BNC (571 for demolition).
Feb 17, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word Schweinefleischpastete
A more impressive term than pork pie.
Feb 15, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word physiogamy
I wonder could it be unlisted because it's a misspelling of physiognomy? What relation -gamy "marriage" might have to the art of studying the face is unclear to this little black duck.
Jan 28, 2011
qroqqa commented on the list lost-for-word
Is it contrapposto you're after? That at least is close.
Jan 27, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word giviak
Whole auks stuffed into a seal carcass and left to ferment. (How can I be the first to even look this up?)
Jan 25, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word befitting
Previously almost invariably transitive; since 1960 however the construction 'befitting of' has greatly increased in popularity. Although Google Books still has it as only minute in numbers by 2000, today's Web shows it coming on very strong.
This is the first comment I have made here using information from the Ngram Viewer.
Jan 25, 2011
qroqqa commented on the list more-than-one-z
zeroize and Zizzer-Zazzer-Zuzz
Jan 24, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word ghiorsium
It is sad that Albert Ghiorso died (26 Dec. 2010) without seeing an element officially named after him, as Glenn Seaborg saw seaborgium. Ghiorsium was informally proposed for ununoctium after its claimed discovery by Berkeley, but the claim had to be withdrawn after fraud was discovered.
Jan 24, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word aisle
Today's aisle/isle distinction is recent, and aisle owes its silent S to isle. Although ultimately from Latin ala "wing", the church word was from about 1600 confused with or merged with isle, and often so spelt. Some time in the 1700s the hybrid spelling aisle came into use, and seems to have become established by about 1800.
In this same time period its use was extended from the side passages, the 'wings', to the central passage, the nave. Some complain that couples walking up the aisle are really walking up the nave, but the usage is long established now.
Jan 24, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word -gress
To give more detail, from -grad-s- in medial position; where the -s forms some perfects and supines. This assimilated to -grass- in the Old Latin period or earlier. In Old Latin stress was initial, and unstressed [a] before two consonants became [e] (so also non-initial morpheme -ject- from jac- "throw").
Jan 20, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word it
Not related to Latin id, despite the apparently obvious connexion via Grimm's Law. The Old English was hit, the [h] being lost in Middle English. This makes it related to he, both from a pre-Germanic *k- root (not as far as I know represented in Latin[1]). The neuter ending -t is however cognate with the -d of Latin id, quid, illud etc.
1. Unless it's the deictic -c(e) of hic, sic.
Jan 20, 2011
qroqqa commented on the word extraposed subject
Term used in the CGEL for the clause that can be equated to a dummy subject 'it', e.g.
It is a mistake to eat eclairs in bed.
In most cases it might have been the subject instead:
To eat eclairs in bed is a mistake.
It has been extraposed from subject position to the end of the clause, after other complements. This distinguishes it from the displaced subject of a dummy 'there' clause, which is merely displaced past the verb:
There are three men in the garden.
Dec 20, 2010
qroqqa commented on the word ruly
Unable to face the OED's new website, I'm going to guess that a noun 'unrule' is attested first (cf. extant 'misrule').
Dec 9, 2010
qroqqa commented on the word arsenic
Having read XKCD first, I didn't realize that arsenic-based life really has been discovered. It's a bacterium that can replace much of its phosphorus with arsenic. (via 3quarksdaily)
Dec 3, 2010
qroqqa commented on the word petuantly
Petulantly actually, unless Stephenie's proof-readers were the same parents who named her.
Dec 2, 2010
qroqqa commented on the word antiquest
Two different morphologies and pronunciations. I found a real example of its use somewhere, over the weekend. I wish I could remember where.
Nov 29, 2010
qroqqa commented on the word glaucous
Even in the side streets there was evidence of the new régime; twice they were obliged to shelter as police lorries thundered past them laden with glaucous prisoners.
—Evelyn Waugh, Scoop
Nov 16, 2010
qroqqa commented on the word flyswatter
The difference is detectable. A voiceless consonant significantly shortens a preceding vowel, so the vowel of [aɪs] is shorter than that of [flaɪ]. The difference is retained in compounds.
Nov 8, 2010
qroqqa commented on the word a bout of estimations
A stern of ships, a light of fires, a jar of doorknobs, a maze of wonders, none of them count.
Oct 12, 2010
qroqqa commented on the word strategy
The reason this works is that the second player beats the first to whatever sequence the first chooses. If the first chose HTH, that begins HT, so any second-player strategy XHT has a 1 in 2 chance of winning one round before HTH comes up. (Rather than the naive 1 in 8 chance of waiting for one or the other triple to turn up.)
You choose your X to make sure it's not symmetric: that the first player hasn't got the same advantage over your sequence. Their choice ends in TH, so you mustn't let yours begin with that. So choose HHT, not THT.
Oct 10, 2010
qroqqa commented on the list crash-blossoms
Real one, cos I saw it last night on a placard; possible a London local paper: Mental health cuts fears.
Oct 7, 2010
qroqqa commented on the word stained glass
The first recorded use of the term is from Mrs Radcliffe's Romance of the Forest (1791):
Above the vast and magnificent portal of this gate arose a window of the same order, whose pointed arches still exhibited fragments of stained glass, once the pride of monkish devotion.
This clearly can't be the first occurrence; but anyway, what did they call it for centuries before that?
Oct 7, 2010
qroqqa commented on the word ackersprit
A potatoe with roots at both ends.
—A Northern word, from Grose's Provincial Glossary
Oct 5, 2010
qroqqa commented on the user zennyatta1
Gretna Green by piggyback, alternating. A roll or two of toilet paper for the bride's dress, and the groom could wallow in a pool of black mud and let it dry. Half a packet of Mr Kipling's Battenberg cakes on a knitting needle. Keep the crumbs to throw.
Oct 4, 2010