mensce

Gammerstang commented on the word mensce

(noun) - Our ancestors used this word to signify a human being in the abstract. Verstegan says in A Restitution of Decayed Intelligence, 1605 very sensibly, "it is a word of necessary use; as, for example, a man beholding some living thing afar off in the field, not well discerning what it is, will say it is either a man or a beast. Now it may be a woman or child, and so not a man, and so he should speak more properly in saying it is either a mensce or a beast."

--Eliezer Edwards' Words, Facts, and Phrases, 1882

January 14, 2018