Pedants' Paradise

[Nick Armstrong]

So, to recap, if you think it is wrong you could be thought elitist and out of touch, but if you think it is acceptable you could be considered uneducated.
If I had a towel I would throw it in, literally, except that it would be a virtual towel and a metaphorical ring, but you know what I mean.

[jean]

What's really interesting, though, is that this is not some new development - people have been using 'literally' in this way since the seventeenth century.

[jean]

I have asked my source, who is usually most meticulous, but he has not yet replied.

He just got the wrong century...

Yes I carefully copied the quotes but was in a tearing hurry to complete the post and leave for the Edinburgh Book festival. The first quote is from the Third Edition of September 2011. True, that's not 102 years ago. But it still lies outside the range of 'news'.

[french frank]

He just got the wrong century...

Mystery solved then.

I don't think we were ever told that this use of 'literally' was 'wrong': we were simply told what 'literally' meant and therefore it appeared to be saying, not only the opposite of what was meant, but even something which on the face of it was very funny although not intended to be. But, that said, ... <shrug>

[Bryn]

Mystery solved then.

I don't think we were ever told that this use of 'literally' was 'wrong': we were simply told what 'literally' meant and therefore it appeared to be saying, not only the opposite of what was meant, but even something which on the face of it was very funny although not intended to be. But, that said, ... <shrug>

It's literally the end of Private Eye's "Literally" items.

[french frank]

M Maréchal's jocular question elsewhere as to whether 'trench mortars' were used for 'Flemish bond' sent me looking up the origin of the word 'mortar' for the connection between the two meanings.

They both seem to derive ultimately from Latin 'mortarium' - receptacle for pounding, product of grinding or pounding (applied by Juvenal to drugs, and by Vitruvius to builder's mortar).

More generally, in English 'A receptacle of a hard material (e.g. marble, brass, wood, or glass), having a cup-shaped cavity in which ingredients used in pharmacy, cookery, etc., are pounded with a pestle.'

So one meaning is the substance that is ground to a paste - in the kitchen and the builder's trade; the other to the receptacle itself, and thence the artillery weapon into which (I presume) explosive powder was introduced to launch the projectile/shell.

[The origin of 'mortarium' is unknown ]

[Alain Maréchal]

[QUOTE=french frank;325744]

More generally, in English 'A receptacle of a hard material (e.g. marble, brass, wood, or glass), having a cup-shaped cavity in which ingredients used in pharmacy, cookery, etc., are pounded with a pestle.'

/QUOTE]

Remembering of course that the pellet with the poison's in the vessel with the pestle; the chalice from the palace has the brew that is true.

[Pabmusic]

...More generally, in English 'A receptacle of a hard material (e.g. marble, brass, wood, or glass), having a cup-shaped cavity in which ingredients used in pharmacy, cookery, etc., are pounded with a pestle.'...

Before WW1 (from the middle ages, in fact) mortars were siege artillery - not portable things that could be used in trenches. Here's one from the American Civil War, and the resemblance to the mortar of a mortar & pestle is obvious:



They don't look like this now, but the name has stuck.

[mercia]

what do we think of the verb to up ?

"The economic recovery is gathering momentum, the British Chambers of Commerce claims, as it sharply ups its growth forecast for this year. "

my salary has been upped ?

[Pabmusic]

what do we think of the verb to up ?

"The economic recovery is gathering momentum, the British Chambers of Commerce claims, as it sharply ups its growth forecast for this year. "

my salary has been upped ?

'He upped the tempo for the final section'. Its use as a verb is quite old. I found this:

The earliest recorded sense is "to drive and catch (swans)," 1560, from up (adv.). Meaning "to get up, rise to one's feet" (as in up and leave) is recorded from 1643. Sense of "to move upward" is recorded from 1737. Meaning "increase" (as in up the price of oil) is attested from 1915. Cf. Old English verb uppian "to rise." Upping block is attested from 1796. [Online Etymological Dictionary]

I think it's useful - I certainly have no problems with it.

[Sir Velo]

Conversely, I downed a pint of beer.

Sounds fine to me.

[Pabmusic]

Conversely, I downed a pint of beer.

Sounds fine to me.

To me too. Though perhaps I'd better double-check...

[mercia]

well I prefer increases to ups - my prediction is that in (let's say) a hundred years, all speech will be reduced to one-syllable words to save time and/or effort

[Pabmusic]

well I prefer increases to ups - my prediction is that in (let's say) a hundred years, all speech will be reduced to one-syllable words to save time and/or effort

You may be right - there is certainly a tendency to find the lowest common denominator, isn't there? Still, we won't be around in a hundred years...

[jean]

If we really thought the more syllables the better, this sort of thing would be admirable rather than amusing:

Scintillate, scintillate, globule vivific,
Fain would I fathom thy nature specific,
Loftily poised in the ether capacious,
Strongly resembling a gem carbonaceous!

When torrid Phoebus removeth his presence,
Ceasing to lamp us with fierce incandescence,
Then you illumine the regions supernal,
Scintillate, scintillate semper nocturnal.

The traveller on lustreless perigrination,
Gratefully hails your minute coruscation,
He could not determine his journey’s direction,
But for your bright scintillating protection.