Hendiadys. sb. /hendI@d@s/ [< LL hendiadys, hendiadyoin, modification of Gk hen dia dyoin 'one through two'] Expressing a single idea by two nouns instead of a by a noun and its qualifier: a type of alleotheta.

Example: "By surge and sea we passed." [Angel Day. 1599. The English Secretary.]

Antiptosis. sb. /,{ntip'tosIs/ [< Gk anti- 'against' + ptosis 'act of falling away; case'(< piptein 'to fall')] Substituting one case for another, as the accusative for the dative: a type of alleotheta.

Examples:

1a. "I give you this gift."
1b. "I give this gift to you."
2a. "He is condemned for murther."
2b. "He is condemned of murther."
[Warren Taylor. 1972. Tudor Figures of Rhetoric.]
3a. "Me Tarzan, you Jane."
3b. "I (am) Trazan, (and) you (are) Jane."
3c. "I am Tarzan of the Apes. I want you. I am yours. You are mine. We will live here together always in my house. I will bring you the best fruits, the tenderest deer, the finest meats that roam the jungle. I will hunt for you. I am the greatest of the jungle hunters. I will fight for you. I am the mightiest of the jungle fighters. When you see this you will know that it is for you and that Tarzan of the Apes loves you."
[3a. Cyril Hume & Ivor Novello. 1932. Tarzan the Ape Man. 3c. Edgar Rice Burroughs. 1912. Tarzan of the Apes.]

Burrough's Tarzan was more articulate than Johnny Weismuller's character in the movie adaptations, but you get the idea. Anyway, antiptosis makes more sense in a language with cases.

Anthimeria. sb. /,{nTI'merija/ The substitution of one part of speech for another: a type of alleotheta.

Examples: 1. "We'll need to architect that as quickly as possible." 2. "I think we ought to productize that API."

This is one of the touchstones of the normative grammarian. Though anthimeria is a neologism, it describes linguistic processes that are common to many languages. The derivation of words of one grammatical category from those of another. When described in traditional latinate terminology it seems less offensive. Who could complain of "denominative verbal forms?" But the "verbing of nouns" is a horror. Anthimeria can be done by adding derivational morphological dessinences, e.g., the -ize in "productize" above, or via a process known as zero derivation: using "architect" as a verb without any suffix. It's OK if Shakespeare uses it: "it out-herods Herod, pray you avoid it" [Hamlet 32.14]. And few would dispute using "smoke" as a verb.

Language is dynamic. Get used to it.

Ucalegon. sb. [< L Ucalegon < Gk Oukalegon < ouk 'not, un-' + alegô 'to have a care, mind, heed'] 1. A neighbor whose house is burning. 2. Proper name: a Trojan elder in the Iliad 3.147 who sat at the Scæan gates.

Quotations

1. "Who at cool Præneste, or at Volsinii amid its leafy hills, was ever afraid of his house tumbling down? Who in modest Gabii, or on the sloping heights of Tivoli? But here we inhabit a city supported for the most part by slender props: for that is how the bailiff holds up the tottering house, patches up gaping cracks in the old wall, bidding the inmates sleep at ease under a roof ready to tumble about their ears. No, no, I must live where there are no fires, no nightly alarms. Ucalegon below is already shouting for water and shifting his chattels; smoke is pouring out of your third-floor attic, but you know nothing of it; for if the alarm begins in the ground-floor, the last man to burn will be he who has nothing to shelter him from the rain but the tiles, where the gentle doves lay their eggs. Codrus possessed a bed too small for the dwarf Procula, a sideboard adorned by six pipkins, with a small drinking cup, and a recumbent Chiron below, and an old chest containing Greek books whose divine lays were being gnawed by unlettered mice. Poor Codrus had nothing, it is true: but he lost that nothing, which was his all; and the last straw in his heap of misery is this, that though he is destitute and begging for a bite, no one will help him with a meal, no one offer him lodging or shelter." [Juvenal. Satira 3.199]

2. The shepherd climbs the cliff, and sees from far
The wasteful ravage of the wat'ry war.
Then Hector's faith was manifestly clear'd,
And Grecian frauds in open light appear'd.
The palace of Deiphobus ascends
In smoky flames, and catches on his friends.
Ucalegon burns next: the seas are bright
With splendor not their own, and shine with Trojan light.
[Vergilius Maro. Æneid 2.311, ed. John Dryden]

3. THERE be two men of all mankind
That I should like to know about;
But search and question where I will,
I cannot ever find them out.

Melchizedek, he praised the Lord,
And gave some wine to Abraham;
But who can tell what else he did
Must be more learned than I am.

Ucalegon, he lost his house
When Agamemnon came to Troy;
But who can tell me who he was--
I’ll pray the gods to give him joy.

There be two men of all mankind
That I’m forever thinking on:
They chase me everywhere I go,--
Melchizedek, Ucalegon.
[Edwin Arlington Robinson. The Collected Poems "Children of the Night: Two Men"]

Epicene. sb. /'epi:,si:n/ [< L epicœnus < Gk epikoinos 'common to many, promiscuous' < epi- 'on, at, beside' + koinos 'common'] 1. Of nouns: having one grammatical gender (i.e., masculine and feminine) but representing both biological sexes. 2. Of persons: having the characteristics of both sexes; effeminate, unmasculine. 3. Lacking the characteristics of either sex.

Quotations: 1. "The Agathyrsi are the most refined of men and especially given to wearing gold. Their intercourse with women is promiscuous, so that they may be consanguine with one another and, all being relations, not harbor jealousy or animosity toward one another. In the rest of their customs they are like the Thracians." [Herodotus. The Histories. 4.104.1. translated by A. D. Godley. The word 'promiscuous' is epikoinos in the original Greek.] 2. "Nor again shall I be in a hurry to regard it as a proof of real diligence, if he points out that there are real nouns of the kind called epicene by the Greeks, in which one gender implies both, or which in spite of being feminine or neuter in form indicate males or females respectively, as for instance Muræna or Glycerium." Quintillian. The Intitutio Oratio. 1.4.24. translated by H. E. Butler.]

The Epicene Pronouns covers the various failed attempts in English for a genderless pronominal system. See also the Gender-neutral Pronoun FAQ. Ben Jonson wrote a play called Epicene or The Silent Woman.

And before any charges of political correctness come in from the grammatically grumpy regarding the mapping of grammatical gender to biological sex, they would do well to consider that there are languages with more than the traditional three grammatical genders of Latin and Greek: e.g., Bantu languages on average have around 15 genders.

Epigone. sb. /'epi:,gA:n/ [< L epigonus < Gk epigonos < epigignesthai 'to be born after' < epi- 'on, at, beside' + gignesthai 'to be born'] 1. A descendant. 2. A follower or inferior imitator. 3. pl. The sons of the Seven against Thebes. (The term is also applied to the descendents of the Diadochi and the offspring of Alexander the Great's soldiers and Asian women.)

Quotation: "The sons of the Grecian heroes who were killed in the First Theban War. The War of the Epigoni is famous in ancient history. It was undertaken ten years after the first. The sons of those who had perished in the first war resolved to avenge the death of their fathers." [Harry Thurston Peck. 1898. Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities.]

The Seven Against Thebes were: Adrastus of Argos and his two sons-in-law, Polynices (the son of Oedipus, king of Thebes, against whom the Seven marched) and Tydeus of Calydon, and four others, Hippomedon, Parthenopæus, Capaneus, and Amphiaraüs.

Got some spam this morning. From a friend. Sort of like friendly fire. Whenever I get one of these near urban legends, I always respond with links to web reference resources. Sigh.

This time it was some blather about free $50.00 gift certificates from Applebees. A quick search in Google turned up the low-down. What always amazes me about something like this, is how the immediacy of email seems to short-circuit critical thinking skills. I'd be amused if it weren't so sad. (I do give Applebees credit though, they have a popup that exposes the hoax.)

On the other hand, Google has a new Dilbert-tie-in logo up this week. Cool.

Captious. adj. /'k{pS@s/ [< F. captieux < L. captiosus 'falacious, sophistical' < captus ppl. of capere 'to take'; cf. Eng have] 1. Apt to catch at faults; disposed to find fault or to cavil; eager to object; difficult to please. 2. Fitted to harass, perplex, or ensnare; insidious; troublesome.

Quotation: "[Edmond] Wilson, on the other hand, had a compulsive competitiveness that meant he had to counterbalance praise with reproach, either providing a list of corrections, no matter how captious, or implying that at the midpoint of a story he had seen a rather better way to finish it than its author had chosen." [Brian Boyd. 1991. Vladimir Nabokov: The American Years, p. 48.]

Well, I've been slowly updating my vanity site, www.bisso.com, of which this blog is a minor part. Finally redid my favorite links page for the first time in over a year. Weeded out lots of dead links and added some more pop commentary. My favorite broken link was the URL for the Nihon Doutoku Shushin party in Japan. The founder was obsessed with disposible enemas. The only thing that turned up in Google was my old links page. If you search on the Internet Archive Wayback Machine you can still find a trace or two of this interesting site.

Been trying to write only compliant HTML and use cascading style sheets, and it's coming along slowly. At some point, I'll have to put some content up on the Sub Pontio Pilato website. Erling and I have been busy prepping for the two performances of SPP: one in Linz, Austria, and the other in San Francisco (at the ODC Theatre).

OK, so it's not really a gallimaufrey of words like my earlier Uncle Jazzbeau's elist was back in '97, but it is an experiment in writing a blog, and we'll just have to see how far it goes.

I wanted to put up a space where I could list interesting words, and their etymologies and meanings, but I think that I won't limit myself to English vocabulary as I had in the past. Any language is fair game.

I'll also review books and films here, too. I've been doing quite a bit of reading lately while commuting to San Francisco on BART.

Currently, I'm studying Russian -- again. I've tried in the past, but it didn't seem to last. Ever since my high school days, when Mr Shashlin tried to teach me a few words and phrases, I have been fascinated with Russian. At Oracle, I had a crash course from Ilya and Slava in Russian literature. I've always liked Nabokov, but then I was introduced to Ilf and Petrov's Ostap Bender novels (The Twelve Chairs and The Golden Calf) and Isaac Babel's Red Cavalry.