One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meanings

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gach
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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by gach »

Are there even any attested instances of *-ms- of the like in Finnic to check the projected outcome?

Anyway, preserving that root could have led to too heavy overloading in the number system and the resulting reshuffling of the numerals could have ended up in, well, discarding precisely that root. It's a pity really.

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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Xephyr »

I just found out about this one:

squatch, v. to go out into the woods looking for bigfoot. Usually used in the expression "to go squatching".

(Wiktionary again lists it as only a noun, and Wiktionary again is wrong.)
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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by linguoboy »

And I just stumbled across gid "a disease of sheep caused by tapeworm".

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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Ser »

Xephyr wrote:
Thry wrote:pecs and abs?
+ delts, lats, glutes, and quads
"rep", maybe also "trap", "core", "ham" and "squat" too (in their meanings specific to workouts)

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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by sirdanilot »

Many seafaring terms in Dutch are very simple monosyllabic words, even though many people don't know what they mean anymore unless they are into sailing or rowing or something. Translations courtesy of wikipedia (I had no idea what most of these words were in English honestly). Incidentally, many of the English translations are also monosyllabic. I'll include verbs with the infinitival suffix -en.

Dutch - english - wiki
giek - boom - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boom_%28sailing%29
ra - yard - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yard_%28sailing%29
dol - ? - thing on a row-boat to which you attach the oars (hey another one !) for rowing - too obscure for wiki to have the dutch page for, at least
roer - rudder
reven - reefing - http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reven
jol - yawl (borrowing from Dutch btw) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yawl
gijpen - jibe or gybe - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jibe

etc. etc.

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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Salmoneus »

Oh, if you go into sailing the possibilities are endless. Just thinking of ship types, there are brigs, barques, ketches, snows, sloops, cogs, flutes, hulks, and so on.

The English cognate for 'dol' is 'thole' (while is also a verb for suffering, whereas a noun for suffering is dole), but this has generally been supplanted by 'rowlock' (pronounced nautically), or more recently just 'oarlock'. And wiktionary suggests a thole is a pin, rather than a lock, but I don't know whether that distinction is actually maintained by people.

Apparently a thole is also a part of a scythe - as are the snath/snaithe/snythe/etc, the beard, and the chine.
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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Drydic »

Salmoneus wrote:The English cognate for 'dol' is 'thole' (while is also a verb for suffering, whereas a noun for suffering is dole), but this has generally been supplanted by 'rowlock' (pronounced nautically)
Really? [nɑɾɪkɫi] is a weird way to pronounce rowlock...
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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Hydroeccentricity »

I found a good one! "Trub," the dead yeast and other precipitate that is left at the bottom of a cask after beer is brewed and aged.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trub_(brewing)
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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Shrdlu »

Hydroeccentricity wrote:I found a good one! "Trub," the dead yeast and other precipitate that is left at the bottom of a cask after beer is brewed and aged.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trub_(brewing)
Don't spread that or we'll end up having it in bread, like that other stuff....
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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by clawgrip »

Nessari wrote:
Salmoneus wrote:The English cognate for 'dol' is 'thole' (while is also a verb for suffering, whereas a noun for suffering is dole), but this has generally been supplanted by 'rowlock' (pronounced nautically)
Really? [nɑɾɪkɫi] is a weird way to pronounce rowlock...
Probably means 50% of the word has been randomly removed so that it becomes one syllable. Something like ro'l'ck looks sufficiently nautical.

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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Salmoneus »

/rQl@k/.
By 'nautically', I meant 'eliminate or schwa-ise all vowels other than the first, and make sure the first vowel is short and closed as though followed by a cluster even when it isn't'.
So, rowlock > rolleck, forecastle > focksel, gunwale > gunnel. Though thinking about it that's not quite right, since 'boatswain' is bosun, not bossun, and 'topgallant sail' is 'tgallentsel', not 'tocslel'.
Anyway, it's similar to the way that you might try to pronounce a lot of English placenames or upper-class surnames. [eg 'alnwick' > 'anneck']
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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by ---- »

Oh yes, the wondrous pronunciations of English towns. Who could forget the historic and beautiful village of Clouscefeddeltoncester (pronounced, of course, identically to 'cluster').

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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Nortaneous »

Japanese borrowed 'Worcestershire' (as in the sauce) as Usutā.

Then again, Malay just calls it Engrish ketchup.
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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Zontas »

Theta wrote:Oh yes, the wondrous pronunciations of English towns. Who could forget the historic and beautiful village of Clouscefeddeltoncester (pronounced, of course, identically to 'cluster').


Clossfeltonster was how I viewed it until literally just then. Also, I always though the lack of r in Worcester was a hyperdialectalism overusing the English pronunciation.
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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Nortaneous »

Real examples include Barnoldswick, pronounced 'bar lick'; Lympne, pronounced 'lim'; and the District of Columbia, pronounced 'hell'.
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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by linguoboy »

Nortaneous wrote:Real examples include Barnoldswick, pronounced 'bar lick'; Lympne, pronounced 'lim'; and the District of Columbia, pronounced 'hell'.
You're living in Maryland and you can't mention Bawlmer?

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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Drydic »

He has in the past.
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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Nortaneous »

The DC and Baltimore areas are two completely different things.
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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Astraios »

Cholmondely 'chum lee'. It also has a marquess, who everybody I ever heard say it pronounces as 'markey' because that sounds Frencher.

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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Salmoneus »

Astraios wrote:Cholmondely 'chum lee'. It also has a marquess, who everybody I ever heard say it pronounces as 'markey' because that sounds Frencher.
Not just that. There are three different words here: marquess (English), marquis (French), and marquis (Scottish: spelled as French but pronounced as English). This has probably left people in a state of confusion as to how it's meant to be said, especially since the English form has always been a rare title.

Possibly people also shy away from 'marquess' toward 'marquis', given this confusion, because 'marquess' is such a weird word - unusual phonologically, and very unusual in being an -ess word that refers to a man.

[On the other hand, calling him a marquis makes him sound like a tent]
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I'se so silly to be flowing but I no canna stay!

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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Drydic »

Salmoneus wrote: marquis (Scottish: spelled as French but pronounced as English)
[mArk_wIs]? [mArki:s]? leaving aside rhotic/nonrhotic for now.
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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Salmoneus »

Nessari wrote:
Salmoneus wrote: marquis (Scottish: spelled as French but pronounced as English)
[mArk_wIs]? [mArki:s]? leaving aside rhotic/nonrhotic for now.
I don't think English is traditionally analysed as having a phonemic labiovelar series, no. So ["mArkwIs]. (But note that that's the fully unstressed , so I guess Americans will have schwa there). I think I've also heard a schwa there, which is what the spelling suggests should be there, but I think that's a spelling pronunciation.
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But the river tripped on her by and by, lapping
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I'se so silly to be flowing but I no canna stay!

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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by ObsequiousNewt »

Don't forget about Roland de Chumsfanleigh.


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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Drydic »

Salmoneus wrote:
Nessari wrote:
Salmoneus wrote: marquis (Scottish: spelled as French but pronounced as English)
[mArk_wIs]? [mArki:s]? leaving aside rhotic/nonrhotic for now.
I don't think English is traditionally analysed as having a phonemic labiovelar series, no. So ["mArkwIs]. (But note that that's the fully unstressed , so I guess Americans will have schwa there). I think I've also heard a schwa there, which is what the spelling suggests should be there, but I think that's a spelling pronunciation.

Well thanks for at least answering the question along with the condescension. And note the [].

I don't know if we'd have schwa or schwi there. I highly doubt the term is anything but borrowed, which messes with its realizations (not to mention it's an incredibly obscure term already).
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Re: One-syllable words with specific technical or rare meani

Post by Nortaneous »

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