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Discussion of research and writing about Virginia history <[log in to unmask]>
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Sat, 6 Jan 2007 14:26:02 -0500
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Discussion of research and writing about Virginia history <[log in to unmask]>
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Re: origin of the eff-word
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Sunshine49 <[log in to unmask]>
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Long ago I read something about this, in relation to the names we
still use for meat foods. Those that were eaten by the Norman
overlords still carry names derived from the French [beef from boef,
etc], while the food of the Saxons and peasants still carry English
or Germanic names.

Nancy

-------
I was never lost, but I was bewildered once for three days.

--Daniel Boone



On Jan 6, 2007, at 11:52 AM, Debra Jackson/Harold Forsythe wrote:

> It makes sense that when the Saxon barons were demoted by the
> French-speaking Normans that the language of the former feudal
> rulers would
> demoted along with the lords themselves.  Law French replaced
> Anglish as the
> language of the courts.  I think it was the poet Robert Graves in his
> handbook on writing, The Reader Over Your Shoulder, who stated that
> the bulk
> of Romance vocabulary imported into English came from the French of
> the
> Normans during their initial 2-3 centuries of occupation.
>
> On the history of languages--vocabulary, grammar, and scripts--
> there is a
> encyclopedic new work.  See Nicholas Ostler, Empires of the Word:  A
> Language History of the World (Harper-Collins, NY, 2005, paperback
> 2006)
>
> Harold S. Forsythe
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Bruce Terrell" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Saturday, January 06, 2007 11:42 AM
> Subject: Re: origin of the eff-word
>
>
>> I can't recall the source but I recall reading something about the
>> relegation of Anglo Saxon
>> words for bodily functions, etc. to profanity while the Latin-
>> based words became preferred.  I'm not sure what the instigation was,
>> possibly w/the rise of
>> the church in Rome during the Dark Ages.  It made sense
>> and seems worth further research.
>>
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