Transcripts

Jeffrey Kacirk:
Words such as "smirk" in Old English used to mean "smile pleasantly." And "dainty" meant "large, buxom, or thriving."

Jeffrey Kacirk, author of the book Altered English, says there are some words that used to have two different meanings, but now have only one.

For example, "trombone" used to refer not only to the instrument, but to the person himself that played the trombone. "Rhetoric" was a person that used rhetoric, not just his way of speaking. Or "cosmetic" was somebody who applied cosmetics.

If you call someone "sanctimonious," that's not a compliment today.

But at one time, "sanctimonious" and also the word "pontificate" were perfectly respectable terms, meaning "holy," and "pontificate" meaning "to preach, but not talk down to."

"Bread-winner" now refers to a person, but the term "bread-winner" used to be the tools of a person's trade. So a carpenter's hammer would be his bread-winner. And the term "aunt" didn't always mean "the sister of your mother or father."

No, it had a little more sinister connotation. An aunt was sometimes used as kind of a sly way of talking about a woman of ill repute. A lot of our words for relatives have changed. "Cousin," for example, became a lot more specific; now it's a particular type of relative, whereas it used to mean pretty much any relative: grandchild, nephew, niece, anything like that. Even sometimes a friend.

At somethingyoushouldknow.net I'm Mike Carruthers and that's Something You Should Know.