"Graduate" and "gradient"
adomp...@yahoo.com
divide into or mark with degrees or other divisions, as the scale of a
thermometer"; as opposed to the more common "to receive a degree or
diploma on completing a course of study". At first glance, the two
uses seem unrelated, but then I realized that when one goes to school
and graduates, the whole point is to enter a higher strata, so that the
school's purpose really is to "graduate" society, in the "divide or
mark with degrees" sense. The plot further thickens when we notice the
dual use of "degree" in each case. Apparently the analogy with
thermometers must have been very deliberate, at one time. Today
"graduate" (emphasis first syllable) is so deeply built into our
vocabularies that, as a noun, we totally fail to notice the underlying
pun!
In fact we've gone so far from explicitly being aware of the
connection, that now we often shorten "graduate" to "grad". And
although not officially in the dictionary, one could argue "grad
school" is a single word: listen to yourself pronounce it, and you'll
realize that in spite of the space, you are pronouncing it as though it
were "gradschool" or "grad-school". It's as if we have short circuited
the rootword: we started with graduatus, derived graduate, and then
took a backward step and made up a new root word "grad" from thin air!
We then duplicate the original derivation and produce the entirely
redundant "grad student"!! Oh my...
The dictionary I'm looking at says "undergrad"'s origin is "by
shortening", but I would dispute that, and suggest rather that it uses
the made-up "grad" rootword :) (btw, if you aren't an "undergrad",
does that make you a "dergrad"? just kidding)
Peter T. Daniels
adomp...@yahoo.com wrote:
> I recently noticed that "graduate" can be used as a verb, to mean "to
> divide into or mark with degrees or other divisions, as the scale of a
> thermometer"; as opposed to the more common "to receive a degree or
> diploma on completing a course of study". At first glance, the two
> uses seem unrelated, but then I realized that when one goes to school
> and graduates, the whole point is to enter a higher strata, so that the
> school's purpose really is to "graduate" society, in the "divide or
> mark with degrees" sense. The plot further thickens when we notice the
> dual use of "degree" in each case. Apparently the analogy with
> thermometers must have been very deliberate, at one time. Today
> "graduate" (emphasis first syllable) is so deeply built into our
> vocabularies that, as a noun, we totally fail to notice the underlying
> pun!
Entirely wrong.
Until just a few decades ago, the school graduated the student -- the
student was graduated at the graduation ceremony.
Then, for a while, the student graduated from school.
Now, in a usage that strikes the middle-aged as subliterate, the
student graduates school.
adomp...@yahoo.com
Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> adomp...@yahoo.com wrote:
> > I recently noticed that "graduate" can be used as a verb, to mean "to
> > divide into or mark with degrees or other divisions, as the scale of a
> > thermometer"; as opposed to the more common "to receive a degree or
> > diploma on completing a course of study". At first glance, the two
> > uses seem unrelated, but then I realized that when one goes to school
> > and graduates, the whole point is to enter a higher strata, so that the
> > school's purpose really is to "graduate" society, in the "divide or
> > mark with degrees" sense. The plot further thickens when we notice the
> > dual use of "degree" in each case. Apparently the analogy with
> > thermometers must have been very deliberate, at one time. Today
> > "graduate" (emphasis first syllable) is so deeply built into our
> > vocabularies that, as a noun, we totally fail to notice the underlying
> > pun!
>
> Entirely wrong.
>
> Until just a few decades ago, the school graduated the student -- the
> student was graduated at the graduation ceremony.
>
> Then, for a while, the student graduated from school.
>
> Now, in a usage that strikes the middle-aged as subliterate, the
> student graduates school.
>
Ahhh, that clears things up a bit :-) Although I can't say I've heard
the latter at all, and I'm in a university myself. I hear the middle
one - "the student graduates from school" - and also a variation on the
last one - "the student graduates." - where the verb seems to be
intransitive.
When used intransitively like that, it does sort of work, in a
perverted way. "The school changed him; he changed. The school broke
him; he broke. The school healed him; he healed. The school graduated
him; he graduated." Speaking of which, is there a special name for
verbs like these, where "X verbed Y" implies "X verbed."? It doesn't
work with all verbs since, for example, "the school expelled him" does
not imply "he expelled"...
I agree, "the student graduates school" makes no sense. (although, for
some unexplainable reason, "the student graduates first grade" seems
fine..... even though logically it's the worst of them all, pairing off
the two uses of "grade" in such an incestuous way)
Colin Fine
The root is Latin 'gradus' - 'step'.
When anything is measured in a scala (Lating 'scala' - 'ladder') the
individual units are naturally called 'gradus'; later, through French
'degree' (apparently 'degradus' - 'step down', though quite why French
generalised the step *down* is not clear).
'Graduating' a flask or a thermometer is marking steps on it.
'Graduating' from a school is taking the next step.
As evidence that the dictionaries are right and you wrong about
'undergrad' I would point out that we say 'undergrad' in Britain, but we
don't generally say 'grad', possibly because the word 'graduate' isn't
used in the sort of context where 'undergrad' and 'postgrad' occur. A
'graduate' is generally somebody who has left university and gone out
into the wide world, and 'graduate school' is an institution we do not have.
BTW, the word 'grad' does exist, and means one four-hundredth of a
circle (9/10 of a degree of angle). I've never come across a context in
which it is used, but according to
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grad_%28angle%29 it has been used in
surveying, and French ordnance.
Colin
benlizross
OED earliest citations:
graduate (n): 1479
(adj): 1494 ("a graduate man")
graduate (v)
1. (institution) graduates (student), i.e. gives a degree to: 1588
2. (student) graduates: 1807
(graduate from: 1892)
grad = graduate (n): 1871 (US)
undergrad = undergraduate: 1827 (UK)
This supports Colin's point that "undergrad" is an independent
shortening and not derived from "grad".
But one qualification: I think a "graduate" is only someone who has a
degree. Just being a student at a place for a year or two and then going
out into the world may make you an alumnus, but not a graduate.
Ross Clark
Mike Wright
> adomp...@yahoo.com wrote:
>> I recently noticed that "graduate" can be used as a verb, to mean "to
>> divide into or mark with degrees or other divisions, as the scale of a
>> thermometer"; as opposed to the more common "to receive a degree or
>> diploma on completing a course of study". At first glance, the two
>> uses seem unrelated, but then I realized that when one goes to school
>> and graduates, the whole point is to enter a higher strata, so that the
>> school's purpose really is to "graduate" society, in the "divide or
>> mark with degrees" sense. The plot further thickens when we notice the
>> dual use of "degree" in each case. Apparently the analogy with
>> thermometers must have been very deliberate, at one time. Today
>> "graduate" (emphasis first syllable) is so deeply built into our
>> vocabularies that, as a noun, we totally fail to notice the underlying
>> pun!
>
> Entirely wrong.
>
> Until just a few decades ago, the school graduated the student -- the
> student was graduated at the graduation ceremony.
Just a few? It's been about 5 decades since my first graduation, and we
were already saying "I graduated from...". Of course, that was junior
high school. Was it different for colleges?
> Then, for a while, the student graduated from school.
>
> Now, in a usage that strikes the middle-aged as subliterate, the
> student graduates school.
> [...]
I thought it was British. Or is that the same as subliterate? (And how
is it that my spellchecker doesn't know "subliterate"--or even
"spellchecker"?)
--
Mike Wright
http://www.raccoonbend.com
Mike Wright
Do you say "grad student" in Britain?
Peter T. Daniels
"Did she graduate high school?" "Naah, she got a GED."
> When used intransitively like that, it does sort of work, in a
> perverted way. "The school changed him; he changed. The school broke
> him; he broke. The school healed him; he healed. The school graduated
> him; he graduated." Speaking of which, is there a special name for
> verbs like these, where "X verbed Y" implies "X verbed."? It doesn't
> work with all verbs since, for example, "the school expelled him" does
> not imply "he expelled"...
You could think of it as ergative. In English, -ee often marks an
ergative -- standee, expellee.
Peter T. Daniels
Mike Wright wrote:
> Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> > adomp...@yahoo.com wrote:
> >> I recently noticed that "graduate" can be used as a verb, to mean "to
> >> divide into or mark with degrees or other divisions, as the scale of a
> >> thermometer"; as opposed to the more common "to receive a degree or
> >> diploma on completing a course of study". At first glance, the two
> >> uses seem unrelated, but then I realized that when one goes to school
> >> and graduates, the whole point is to enter a higher strata, so that the
> >> school's purpose really is to "graduate" society, in the "divide or
> >> mark with degrees" sense. The plot further thickens when we notice the
> >> dual use of "degree" in each case. Apparently the analogy with
> >> thermometers must have been very deliberate, at one time. Today
> >> "graduate" (emphasis first syllable) is so deeply built into our
> >> vocabularies that, as a noun, we totally fail to notice the underlying
> >> pun!
> >
> > Entirely wrong.
> >
> > Until just a few decades ago, the school graduated the student -- the
> > student was graduated at the graduation ceremony.
>
> Just a few? It's been about 5 decades since my first graduation, and we
> were already saying "I graduated from...". Of course, that was junior
> high school. Was it different for colleges?
Just a few decades ago, the prescriptivists were insisting on the
earlier usage.
> > Then, for a while, the student graduated from school.
> >
> > Now, in a usage that strikes the middle-aged as subliterate, the
> > student graduates school.
> > [...]
>
> I thought it was British. Or is that the same as subliterate? (And how
> is it that my spellchecker doesn't know "subliterate"--or even
> "spellchecker"?)
Maybe it wants those archaic things known as "hyphens." The Chicago
Manual notes that omitting them is usually preferable.
Peter T. Daniels
The latest Cornell Alumni Electronic Newesletter calls Christopher
Reeve an "alumnus," and even lists him as '74, but I'm pretty sure he
didn't graduate. (He used to wander around our dorm my senior year
[71-72] in pajamas at all hours -- in those days he was tall and skinny
-- and the only part I saw him in on stage was Pozzo in *Godot*.) In
both of his memoirs, he kind of glosses over the Cornell years -- he
was already getting gigs on Broadway in those days. (E.g., opposite
Katharine Hepburn in *A Matter of Gravity*.)
mb
> > When used intransitively like that, it does sort of work, in a
> > perverted way. "The school changed him; he changed. The school broke
> > him; he broke. The school healed him; he healed. The school graduated
> > him; he graduated." Speaking of which, is there a special name for
> > verbs like these, where "X verbed Y" implies "X verbed."? It doesn't
> > work with all verbs since, for example, "the school expelled him" does
> > not imply "he expelled"...
>
> You could think of it as ergative. In English, -ee often marks an
> ergative -- standee, expellee.
Or, in Archie Goodwin's words "there's a doer and a doee".
Pierre Jelenc
>
> Now, in a usage that strikes the middle-aged as subliterate, the
> student graduates school.
It is pretty much the norm in New York, though, and has been for years;
it is even the usual expression in print. It was already commonplace
when I moved there 35 years ago.
From Google:
Times News Post
"graduate high-school" 427 14 14
"graduate from high-school" 292 6 4
Pierre
--
Pierre Jelenc | New on Home Office Records: Ethan Lipton
| www.homeofficerecords.com www.ethanlipton.com
The Gigometer | Pepper Of The Earth: the HO blog
www.gigometer.com | www.homeofficerecords.com/blog
Colin Fine
It certainly is not. We do not graduate from (high) school at all, only
from college/university, and only if what we take is a degree (as
opposed to a certificate or diploma). (You can probably find examples of
'graduate' with respect to diplomas, but it is not common).
While the subject of the degree is arguably a complement, the university
(not 'school') is certainly an adjunct.
Colin
Colin Fine
No.
I think this means 'postgrad'.
Colin
Dusan Vukotic
Serbian GRAD (city, town), GRAÐEVINA (building), GRADITI (build), RAD
(work), RED (order, array), UREÐENJE (arrangement), GREDA (girder,
balk, beam).
There is a Serbian syntagm GRAÐENJE LICNOSTI or IZGRAÐIVANJE
LICNOSTI (building of personality), directly pointing to the
"construction" process during the child's education.
DV
Richard Herring
adomp...@yahoo.com writes
[...]
>
>The dictionary I'm looking at says "undergrad"'s origin is "by
>shortening", but I would dispute that, and suggest rather that it uses
>the made-up "grad" rootword :) (btw, if you aren't an "undergrad",
>does that make you a "dergrad"? just kidding)
Worse than that. In Cambridge (England) townspeople's slang, "grad" is
used (as a truncation of "undergraduate") to refer to anyone at the
university, regardless of academic qualifications.
--
Richard Herring
Richard Herring
<ne...@raccoonbend.com> writes
No, in BrE the "from" is obligatory. And, as Colin Fine points out, we
don't do it from "school".
> Or is that the same as subliterate? (And how is it that my
>spellchecker doesn't know "subliterate"--or even "spellchecker"?)
>
--
Richard Herring
Paul J Kriha
news:1165225825....@l12g2000cwl.googlegroups.com...
>adomp...@yahoo.com wrote:>
> I recently noticed that "graduate>" can be used as a verb, to mean "to
> divide into or mark with degrees> or other divisions, as the scale of a
> diploma on completing a course> of study". At first glance, the two
> uses seem unrelated, but then I> realized that when one goes to school
> and graduates, the whole point >is to enter a higher strata, so that the
> mark with degrees" sense. The> plot further thickens when we notice the
> thermometers must have been v>ery deliberate, at one time. Today
> "graduate" (emphasis first syllab>le) is so deeply built into our
> vocabularies that, as a noun, we> totally fail to notice the underlying
> pun!>
>>
>> In fact we've gone so far from explicitly being aware of the
>> connection, that now we often shorten "graduate" to "grad". And
>> although not officially in the dictionary, one could argue "grad
>> school" is a single word: listen to yourself pronounce it, and you'll
>> realize that in spite of the space, you are pronouncing it as though it
>> were "gradschool" or "grad-school". It's as if we have short circuited
>> the rootword: we started with graduatus, derived graduate, and then
>> took a backward step and made up a new root word "grad" from thin air!
>> We then duplicate the original derivation and produce the entirely
>> redundant "grad student"!! Oh my...
>>
>> The dictionary I'm looking at says "undergrad"'s origin is "by
>> shortening", but I would dispute that, and suggest rather that it uses
>> the made-up "grad" rootword :) (btw, if you aren't an "undergrad",
>> does that make you a "dergrad"? just kidding)
>
>(work), RED (order, array), UREĐENJE (arrangement), GREDA (girder,
>balk, beam).
>There is a Serbian syntagm GRAĐENJE LICNOSTI or IZGRAĐIVANJE
>LICNOSTI (building of personality), directly pointing to the
>"construction" process during the child's education.
>
>DV
How is any of these words related to English "grad",
an abbreviation of "graduate" and "gradient"?
pjk
Peter T. Daniels
Pierre Jelenc wrote:
> Peter T. Daniels <gram...@verizon.net> writes:
> >
> > Now, in a usage that strikes the middle-aged as subliterate, the
> > student graduates school.
>
> It is pretty much the norm in New York, though, and has been for years;
> it is even the usual expression in print. It was already commonplace
> when I moved there 35 years ago.
>
> From Google:
>
> Times News Post
> "graduate high-school" 427 14 14
> "graduate from high-school" 292 6 4
If you remove the otiose hyphen, you might find more realistic results.
You claim that the New York Times uses "NN graduated high school" more
than 33% more often than "NN graduated from high school"? That is not
credible.
Especially if you searched exactly the forms you show there -- in what
construction would they occur?
Dusan Vukotic
> >(work), RED (order, array), UREÐENJE (arrangement), GREDA (girder,
> >balk, beam).
> >There is a Serbian syntagm GRAÐENJE LICNOSTI or IZGRAÐIVANJE
> >LICNOSTI (building of personality), directly pointing to the
> >"construction" process during the child's education.
> >
> >DV
>
> How is any of these words related to English "grad",
> an abbreviation of "graduate" and "gradient"?
> pjk
Are you really so unintelligent? During the process of any construction
(Serb. GRAĐENJE, GRADITI build, building) it is inevitabe to go
through the certain phases (grads, grades. gradients); for example, in
house construction there are basement, fundament, walls, roof.
In school you must go to the "roof" if you want to graduate.
Gradient is a graded change in the magnitude of some physical quantity
or dimension.
DV
Brian M. Scott
<gram...@verizon.net> wrote in sci.lang:
> benlizross wrote:
[...]
>> But one qualification: I think a "graduate" is only someone who has a
>> degree. Just being a student at a place for a year or two and then going
>> out into the world may make you an alumnus, but not a graduate.
> The latest Cornell Alumni Electronic Newesletter calls Christopher
> Reeve an "alumnus," and even lists him as '74, but I'm pretty sure he
> didn't graduate. [...]
Pomona refers to John Cage as an alumnus, though he attended for
only two years.
Brian
Arndt Jonasson
> OED earliest citations:
>
> graduate (n): 1479
> (adj): 1494 ("a graduate man")
>
> graduate (v)
> 1. (institution) graduates (student), i.e. gives a degree to: 1588
> 2. (student) graduates: 1807
> (graduate from: 1892)
>
> grad = graduate (n): 1871 (US)
> undergrad = undergraduate: 1827 (UK)
>
> This supports Colin's point that "undergrad" is an independent
> shortening and not derived from "grad".
>
> But one qualification: I think a "graduate" is only someone who has a
> degree. Just being a student at a place for a year or two and then going
> out into the world may make you an alumnus, but not a graduate.
>
> Ross Clark
It seems likely that thermometers were not the origin of the connection
of "graduate" with students. The not totally reliable source wikipedia
says that thermometers were first equipped with a scale by Santorio
Santorio, born 1561.
As for "grad", that happens to be the word for "degree" in both Swedish
and German.
benlizross
ProQuest NYT confirms your belief. Searching the period 2001-2005
"graduated from high(-)school" 212
"graduated high(-)school" 10
(The search appears to make no distinction between hyphen and space. The
form "highschool" does not occur.)
Likewise
"graduated from Harvard" 241
"graduated Harvard" 4 (one of which, on examination, actually turned
out to say "graduated from Harvard"!)
Ross Clark
Dusan Vukotic
Degree... from the V.Latin 'degradus' (a step or stage in a process);
Serb. 'dograditi' (upgrade) and 'odgraditi' (unfold)
DV
Pierre Jelenc
>
> Especially if you searched exactly the forms you show there -- in what
> construction would they occur?
In Google searches, X-Y means "X Y" OR "X-Y" OR "XY" OR "X[any-blank-or-
punctuation]Y".
In fact, the result is independent of the hyphen:
"graduate high school" site:nytimes.com 427
"graduate from high school" site:nytimes.com 292
benlizross
I'm baffled by the discrepancy between your figures and what I found
using the ProQuest NYT files. Can you describe your search procedure in
more detail? What were the time limits?
Ross Clark
Brian M. Scott
<benl...@ihug.co.nz> wrote in
<news:45748C...@ihug.co.nz> in sci.lang:
> Pierre Jelenc wrote:
>> Peter T. Daniels <gram...@verizon.net> writes:
>>> Especially if you searched exactly the forms you show there -- in what
>>> construction would they occur?
>> In Google searches, X-Y means "X Y" OR "X-Y" OR "XY" OR "X[any-blank-or-
>> punctuation]Y".
>> In fact, the result is independent of the hyphen:
>> "graduate high school" site:nytimes.com 427
>> "graduate from high school" site:nytimes.com 292
> I'm baffled by the discrepancy between your figures and what I found
> using the ProQuest NYT files. Can you describe your search procedure in
> more detail? What were the time limits?
He explicitly didn't set any: he simply did Google searches
on the strings
"graduate high school" site:nytimes.com
and
"graduate from high school" site:nytimes.com
He's getting currently indexed web pages.
Brian
Brian M. Scott
<b.s...@csuohio.edu> wrote in
<news:z68diglh70i3$.tjvenktq...@40tude.net> in
sci.lang:
> On Tue, 05 Dec 2006 10:02:49 +1300, benlizross
> <benl...@ihug.co.nz> wrote in
> <news:45748C...@ihug.co.nz> in sci.lang:
[...]
>> What were the time limits?
> He explicitly didn't set any: [...]
Oops: that was supposed to be 'didn't explicitly set'.
Brian
Colin Fine
Are you really so unintelligent? PJK asked about how the WORDS were
related, not whether it is possible to drag some far-fetched semantic
relationship between them. By your argument every process, and every
result of a process, should have a name like 'grad'.
Colin
benlizross
This sounds like it might be an explanation, but I'm not familiar with
the use of the "site:" specification in Google searches. What exactly is
he getting?
Ross Clark
Brian M. Scott
<benl...@ihug.co.nz> wrote in
<news:4574AE...@ihug.co.nz> in sci.lang:
> Brian M. Scott wrote:
>> On Tue, 05 Dec 2006 10:02:49 +1300, benlizross
>> <benl...@ihug.co.nz> wrote in
>> <news:45748C...@ihug.co.nz> in sci.lang:
>>> Pierre Jelenc wrote:
[...]
>>>> "graduate high school" site:nytimes.com 427
>>>> "graduate from high school" site:nytimes.com 292
>>> I'm baffled by the discrepancy between your figures and what I found
>>> using the ProQuest NYT files. Can you describe your search procedure in
>>> more detail? What were the time limits?
>> He explicitly didn't set any: he simply did Google searches
>> on the strings
>> "graduate high school" site:nytimes.com
>> and
>> "graduate from high school" site:nytimes.com
>> He's getting currently indexed web pages.
> This sounds like it might be an explanation, but I'm not
> familiar with the use of the "site:" specification in
> Google searches. [...]
It restricts the search to pages whose domain ends in
'nytimes.com'. If you search for <þórr site:is>, say,
you'll get pages containing 'þórr' on Icelandic sites.
(Actually, it will also match forms without the accent and
forms with <th> instead of thorn.)
Another useful keyword is 'inurl', as in <inurl:talan>,
which picks up only pages that have 'talan' somewhere in the
URL.
Brian
Peter T. Daniels
So how do you explain his bizarre results? Compared with Ross's, to
boot?
Brian M. Scott
<gram...@verizon.net> wrote in
<news:1165276691.4...@80g2000cwy.googlegroups.com>
in sci.lang:
[...]
> So how do you explain his bizarre results? Compared with
> Ross's, to boot?
There's material on the site that was never in the paper.
E.g., the URL for the first hit on 'graduate high school' is
apparently for a forum where readers can express their
opinions.
Brian
benlizross
Thanks. That could be useful.
HOWEVER, an unrestricted search of ProQuest NYT gets the following:
"graduate high school" 376 [A large percentage of these are classified
ads, going back as far as the 1920s]
"graduated high school" 157
"graduate from high school" 1002
"graduated from high school" 2418
Thus, in this paper, the "from" usage is both recently and historically
by far the most common.
It would seem that Pierre's results can only be explained by nytimes.com
containing a lot of material that is not actually in the paper. I have
neither the time nor the motivation to explore what this might be.
Ross Clark
Joe Fineman
> On 3 Dec 2006 19:54:35 -0800, "Peter T. Daniels"
> <gram...@verizon.net> wrote in sci.lang:
>> The latest Cornell Alumni Electronic Newesletter calls Christopher
>> Reeve an "alumnus," and even lists him as '74, but I'm pretty sure
>> he didn't graduate. [...]
>
> Pomona refers to John Cage as an alumnus, though he attended for
> only two years.
At Caltech, you are stricken from the rolls if you flunk out. You
have to get a degree to be an alumnus.
Harvard, OTOH, considers me an alumnus on the strength of my having
survived three months in its graduate school in 1959. That entitles
me to buy a library card (a valuable privilege) & to be asked for
donations.
--
--- Joe Fineman jo...@verizon.net
||: In German there are no regular nouns, and in psychology :||
||: there are no normal minds. :||
Brian M. Scott
<jo...@verizon.net> wrote in
<news:uy7pnm...@verizon.net> in sci.lang:
> "Brian M. Scott" <b.s...@csuohio.edu> writes:
>> On 3 Dec 2006 19:54:35 -0800, "Peter T. Daniels"
>> <gram...@verizon.net> wrote in sci.lang:
>>> The latest Cornell Alumni Electronic Newesletter calls Christopher
>>> Reeve an "alumnus," and even lists him as '74, but I'm pretty sure
>>> he didn't graduate. [...]
>> Pomona refers to John Cage as an alumnus, though he attended for
>> only two years.
> At Caltech, you are stricken from the rolls if you flunk out. You
> have to get a degree to be an alumnus.
'Flunk out' and 'get a degree' do not exhaust the
possibilities.
[...]
Brian
Peter T. Daniels
likely a noun, then
Dusan Vukotic
Are you getting paid for that "translation" work? I suppose Kriha knows
well what he was asking me.
DV
Paul J Kriha
news:el29ok$fgu$1$8302...@news.demon.co.uk...
> Dusan Vukotic wrote:
> > Paul J Kriha wrote:
> >> Dusan Vukotic <dusan....@gmail.com> wrote in message
> >> news:1165225825....@l12g2000cwl.googlegroups.com...
I suppose it's my fault for asking _him_ any questions.
By now, I should have known he knows more about my intelligence
then, for instance, how to get quotations from online Vasmer.
pjk
Dusan Vukotic
I cannot believe!; one additional extra-fragile soul in front of
me...he, he, he... ;-)
DV
ps
Do not follow the BRIAN DOWN BRAIN treads; IED down your brain down.
Paul J Kriha
Yes, indeed I do, and so does Colin.
pjk
Franz Gnaedinger
Dusan Vukotic wrote:
>
> Serbian GRAD (city, town), GRAÐEVINA (building), GRADITI (build), RAD
> (work), RED (order, array), UREÐENJE (arrangement), GREDA (girder,
> balk, beam).
> There is a Serbian syntagm GRAÐENJE LICNOSTI or IZGRAÐIVANJE
> LICNOSTI (building of personality), directly pointing to the
> "construction" process during the child's education.
Magdalenian GRA means a cave with painted walls,
pertaining to the permutation group GRA ARG,
RGA AGR, GAR RAG (see my etymological thread).
A drawing is carried out gradually. First you may
draw the line of the head, neck, back and tail, as
proposed by Leroy Gourhan, and you see the animal
appear before your eyes, as if by some magic ...
Then you may add further lines, an eye, more details,
and colors.
Hypothetical GRA survives in graphic. Another word
for a graphic is picture, in German Bild, while Bildung
means education: the picture of the world we acquire
gradually. The etymology of German Bild is unclear,
so let me link it with English build, Middle English bilden,
Old English byldan, from bold, a variation of botl for
dwelling (Webster's). Old High German bilidin means
to form. Danish bild means the tool of a mason. Noble
buildings have always been decorated with graphic
elements and pictures - Bildern -, as the caves of old.
Also buildings form gradually, so there might actually
be a parallel between Serbian Grad and Latin graduate,
as descendants of GRA, while English build would go
back to ancient Greek polis for town, fortified dwelling,
capital, consider also German Bollwerk for a fortress,
and if there was a Magdalenian or Azilian root of these
words, it might have been POL:
POL --- fortified dwelling; ancient Greek polis for
town, fortified dwelling, capital, German Bollwerk
for a fortress
LOP --- hedge or wall around a dwelling; ancient
Greek lopos for rind, shell, husk
PLO --- walls made in the wattle-and-daub technique;
ancient Greek plokos for texture, wickerwork, tissue,
fabric (consider for example the wattle-and-daube
hedges around temples of the Bird Goddess in the
Balkans)
OLP --- wealth and power concentrated in a fortified
dwelling; ancient Greek olbos for luck, blessing,
salvation, wealth, power
LPO --- the labyrinth of tents, huts, houses, and the
ways and lanes in between; ancient Greek labyrinthos
OPL --- protectors of a fortified dwelling; ancient Greek
hoplitaes for soldiers on their feet (in contrast to riders)
Dusan, you may be on the right track when linking
education with the process of building, but please
converse with Brian in another tone. Be aware that
you are being tested. They provoke you in order to
see whether you got arguments, or whether you will
freak out when under attack. Avoid the trap, provide
arguments when replying to Brian and others. As I
told you before, Brian M. Scott is doing a good job
in sci.lang, he answered many a difficult question
by consulting the big volumes of the Oxford English
Dictionary OED. Daring hypotheses require good
arguments. A flaming war won't help you survive in
sci.lang.
Regards Franz Gnaedinger
Dusan Vukotic
Franz: POL --- fortified dwelling; ancient Greek polis for
town, fortified dwelling, capital, German Bollwerk
for a fortress
It seems that nobody followed what I was talking about.
Your POL is in fact the ancient sun god BEL
God Bel (the sun) has three main characteristic:
- fire, flame (Serb. purenje, plamen)
- roundness; round form of the sun (Serb. oblo round)
- irradiation of light (Serb. 'belo' white)
I am going ti try to explain the Germanic 'build' in a different way.
Of course, you are absolutely right when connecting this word to the
Greek 'polis'. In Serbian, there are the words 'palata', 'pojata' and
'vajat', all denoting some kind of housing (cf. Greek πόλη city,
town; παλάτι palace, πλίνθος adobe, πλεκτή
ζακέτα cardigan, πλέκω knit, braid; Serb. 'blato' mud, mire,
sludge, 'pletara & blatara' the house made of mud and entwined
brushwood; Eng. plaited).
I have no time to go here in tiniest details but I hope you will be
able to catch the main point.
One would have asked in which way all the above words could be related
and what the sun got to do with the words like the Serbian 'blato'
(mud), 'pletenje' (plaiting) and 'palata' (palace);
I bielive you are able now to comprehend that the English 'build' is
closely related to the Serbian words 'oblik' (form; from the sun /Bel;
round form, Serb. oblo), 'uobliti' (give something a final form,
modulate), 'oblikovati' (model, mold, shape);
In Serbian you can find another syntagm (beside the one iI mentioned
earlier; 'građenje ličnosti'): it is 'oblikovati ličnost' (to build
personality); in fact it is the same as the above mentioned Serbian
verb 'uobliti / uobličiti; shaping, final modeling).
Maybe the next thread of words will help you to understand more clearly
what I am talking about:
BEL (the sun god) > BELO (white; light irradiation) > OBLO (round;
roundness of teh sun) > OBLIK (form) > UOBLITI (give the final form;
Germanic BILD) > OBALA (coast; round form again) > BLATO (mud; near the
coast) > PLOVITI (sail) > PLIVATI (swim) > OBLITI (splash, suffuse;
Germanic BLUT; in relation with FLOAT, FLUSS, FLOOD, FLUT; Serb.
PLUTATI /float)
Mit herzlichen Grüßen
Dušan Vukotić
Dusan Vukotic
Franz Gnaedinger wrote:
The basis of grafo (γραφή writing) is the ur-basis HOR-BEL.
Serbian GREBATI (scratch), GREBANJE (scratch, scrape).
German SCHREIBEN, Latin SCRIBO, SCRIBERE, English SCRIBE and Serbian
IZGREBATI (scrape).
Now, compare the English SCRAPE and SCRIBE with the Serbian IZGREBATI
(IZGREBE, IZGREBAO) and yuo must get a complete and clear picture of
the "development" of writing.
It is unnecessary to mention that the word 'write' appeared from the
Germanic 'writan/ ritan/ rizan' which has the meaning 'scratch' or
'scrape' (Serb. RISANJE, Russ. рисовать/ risovatь (draw,
depict); RISANJE/ RISATI is obtained by apheresis from the Serbian
OBRIS (outline, contour, silhouette, shape).
Now I hope you are able to see that I do not go from the word A to the
word B at random. I do follow the clean-cut SCRAPED path (SCRIPT)
inside the different IE languages.
Regards,
Dušan Vukotić
Franz Gnaedinger
Dusan Vukotic wrote:
>
> The basis of grafo (γραφή writing) is the ur-basis HOR-BEL.
> Serbian GREBATI (scratch), GREBANJE (scratch, scrape).
> German SCHREIBEN, Latin SCRIBO, SCRIBERE, English SCRIBE and Serbian
> IZGREBATI (scrape).
>
> Now, compare the English SCRAPE and SCRIBE with the Serbian IZGREBATI
> (IZGREBE, IZGREBAO) and yuo must get a complete and clear picture of
> the "development" of writing.
>
> It is unnecessary to mention that the word 'write' appeared from the
> Germanic 'writan/ ritan/ rizan' which has the meaning 'scratch' or
> 'scrape' (Serb. RISANJE, Russ. рисовать/ risovatь (draw,
> depict); RISANJE/ RISATI is obtained by apheresis from the Serbian
> OBRIS (outline, contour, silhouette, shape).
>
> Now I hope you are able to see that I do not go from the word A to the
> word B at random. I do follow the clean-cut SCRAPED path (SCRIPT)
> inside the different IE languages.
Until now we followed single words down into a long
bygone past. My method allows to look out for groups
of words. I claim permutation groups that come into
focus on the Magdalenian level of time. G R A allows
six permutations, and all six of them define the meaning
of a single word more clearly. You can find my message
if you google for gra arg in sci.lang (etymological thread).
Here is the what I gave: GRA --- a cave with painted walls;
ancient Greek chaeronos for cave, German graben for to
dig, Grab for tomb, vault, ancient Greek graphein for
drawing, painting, graphic. The first meaningful lines were
drawn into wet clay, this was a form of drawing and writing
at the same time, and here you have the link with your above
words in Slavic tongues.
I use a method for mining words: my permutation groups
that come into focus on the Magdalenian level of time.
A new idea. I follow it, and see how far I come. Until now
I came quite far, and it's a lot of fun. I see that also you
have fun tracing words, but, in order to survive in sci.lang,
you need a clearly defined method, or if not you, then your
readers: they will never be satisfied if you just perform
semantic acrobatics, walking along the horizon, leaping
from the roof of a near house to the top of a distant mountain
range to a wooded hill in the middle ground ... to say it with
a metaphor.
Regards Franz Gnaedinger
>
> Regards,
> Dušan Vukotić
Dusan Vukotic
GRA ARG, RGA AGR, GAR RAG --- rock paintings
>GRA --- a cave with painted walls; ancient Greek
chaeronos for cave, German graben for to dig,
Grab for tomb, vault; ancient Greek graphein
for drawing, painting, graphic<
- Ancient ur-basis HOR-BEL
Serbian GREBATI (srape, scratch), GROB (grave, tomb), GRBA (hunch,
hummock), GRABLJENJE (grab)
ŠKRABATI unintelligible writing; from ZAGREBATI.
Zagreb - Agram; probably a German nasalization of Agrab; Zagreb > Agrab
> Agram; according to the same logic the Greek graphein has also been nasalized in the word γραμματική (greba > graba > γράμμα / letter; grammatike < grebatike.
I do not understand how do you expect somone to apprehend the history
of some specific word without the use of semantic and logic. I told you
everything about my methodology beggining with the SHUR-BEL-GON -UM
speech formula and ending with the most comprehensive semantic and
logical explanation (as the above one) and conclusions.
-The Lat. cavern, cava; Serb. ŠUPLJIKAVO holow; hence the Greek
σπηλιά = Serb. ŠPILJA and the Latin 'cavum') does not belong
here - you have made a mistake because the Latin 'caverna' possibly is
related to the Serbian word KOVRNDIJA (an endless hollow), from the
secondary GON-BR-GON ancient basis; hence the Greek
κυβερνήτης equal to the Serbian GOVORNIK (the man who speek
in the name of many people, Eng. governor). The similar process could
be seen in the Greek word εκλέγω (elect), related to the Serbian
'oglasiti' (notify, advertise, promulgate, placard, post) and
'proglasiti' (proclaim). The Greek εκκλησία (church) is the
place where the God 'proclaims' (Serb. oglas, oglašava) his
sovereignty (Serb, suveren).
>ARG --- walls and ceilings of a decorated cave,
shining up in the light of oil lamps, representing
the sky; ancient Greek argos for white, shimmering<
Ur-basis HOR-GON
The modern Greek αργά ή γρήγορα (sooner or later) shows
that this word (γρήγορα sooner; γρήγορος quick, fast;
Serbian KORAK step; KORAČATI step, walk; cf. KORČULA - KORKYRA;
HERAKLES) must be in relation with the ancient gods URANUS and CHRONOS
(I thing I mentioned it in one of my previous messages) and the Serbian
verb URANITI (get up early in the morning) and URANAK (reveille) -
Serbian RANO (early), RANIJE (sooner). In addition, there is the
Serbian ZORA (dawn), which is representing the constant SUR vs HOR
rivalry (satem-centum division); ZORA and URANAK, RANO.
>RGA --- fissured, craggy, both for the land as hunting
ground and for the walls of a decorated cave as
painting ground; ancient Greek rogos for fissured,
craggy<
Ur-basis HOR-GON
Serbian KRŠ (crag; rugged ground; topographically very uneven);
KREČENJE (wall painting); Serb. CRTANJE (drawing) has the same source
as the Serbian words KRETANJE (movement) and KRUŽENJE (circling, KRUG
circle). I think it would be unneeded to mention that all this words
are firmly related either in form, in meaning, or in morphology.
>AGR --- to catch animals, both in natura, when
hunting them, and metaphorically, when drawing
them; ancient Greek agreo for I catch, capture<
Ur-basis HOR-GON
Serb. KROTITI (to tame wild animals; Gr. κροτειν strike, beat;
κρουειν crush, crash > Serb. KRŠITI (crash); syntagm KRŠENJE
VOLJE braeking of the will; rebuilding someone's behavior in a manner
found acceptable),
Serb. OGRAĐEN (surrounded by fence), UKROĆEN (tamed), UKRUĆEN stiff,
not movable, UKRADEN (stolen, taken dishonestly; UKRADENA MLADA a
stolen bride, cought by surprise)
>GAR --- opening, crack, crevice, fissure in rock,
where animals emerge from and disappear into
according to a very ancient belief; ancient Greek
charade for crevice, crack, gorge, river bed,
torrent<
Again ur-basis HOR-GON
Greek χαράζω inscribe; χαράδρα ravine, glen, a deep narrow
steep-sided valley (especially one formed by running water; Eng.
corridor; Serb. KRUNJENJE, RUNJENJE gin, grind (cf. Germanic "alphabet"
RUNES)
>RAG --- shape of an animal, especially the line
of the back, according to André Leroy-Gourhan
the first line when animals were drawn, making
them appear as if by a miracle; ancient Greek
rachos for back, also used for hills and mountains<
Ur-basis HOR-GON
Serbian KRESTA (crest), KRSTA (back, spine), Latin crista (crest,
plume, rooster's comb), Greek ράχη backboard; Serbian GRANA
(branch), GRANICA (border, the edge of an object), KRHKO (fragile),
KRHOTINE (remnants)
As you see, there are no permutations at all in the examples you cited.
Given number of elements here is ordered in the same way, only there
are some processes of elision of the initial or middle velar 'h/g/k'
from the ur-basis HOR-GON.
Regards,
Dušan Vukotić