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Usenet Posted 22 years ago
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"Mosaic" and "mosaic": homographs?
According to a definition that I prefer*, a word is a homograph of another word if the two are spelled the same and have different etyma, but may be pronounced the same and may even mean the same.
The words "Mosaic" and "mosaic" come quite close to meeting the definition, differing only in the capitalization of the first. Should we still say they make a homographic pair? (I vote for including them in a list of homographs, but with an asterisk.)
(The etymology of "Mosaic" has to do with Moses; of "mosaic", with muses.)
* See
http://www.exw6sxq.com/sparky/aue related/homo-defs.html . Note that my preferred definition is the same as the one in the Oxford English Dictionary except that I prefer to not require homographs to have different meanings. The difference in the two definitions is slight since English words that have come from different etyma to converge to the same spelling and the same meaning seem to be at least extremely rare and may be nonexistent. (A debatable candidate is "biddy").
The words "Mosaic" and "mosaic" come quite close to meeting the definition, differing only in the capitalization of the first. Should we still say they make a homographic pair? (I vote for including them in a list of homographs, but with an asterisk.)
(The etymology of "Mosaic" has to do with Moses; of "mosaic", with muses.)
* See
http://www.exw6sxq.com/sparky/aue related/homo-defs.html . Note that my preferred definition is the same as the one in the Oxford English Dictionary except that I prefer to not require homographs to have different meanings. The difference in the two definitions is slight since English words that have come from different etyma to converge to the same spelling and the same meaning seem to be at least extremely rare and may be nonexistent. (A debatable candidate is "biddy").
Top answer
[nq:1]According to a definition that I prefer*, a word is a homograph of another word if the two are spelled ... ; cf. )), on the principle that such shrines were decorated with mosaics (on which theory a parallel to the post-classical Latin form may be seen in post-classical Latin ARCHIVE n.
- [nq:1]According to a definition that I prefer*, a word is a homograph of another word if the two are spelled ...
- ; cf.
- )), on the principle that such shrines were decorated with mosaics (on which theory a parallel to the post-classical Latin form may be seen in post-classical Latin ARCHIVE n.
- ), but there is insufficient evidence to support this.
- v.
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1 Answers
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[nq:1]According to a definition that I prefer*, a word is a homograph of another word if the two are spelled ... list of homographs, but with an asterisk.) (The etymology of "Mosaic" has to do with Moses; of "mosaic", with muses.)[/nq]
It has traditionally been suggested that classical Latin , derives from ancient Greek a place holy to the Muses (> classical Latin , : see MUSEUM n.), in B
It has traditionally been suggested that classical Latin , derives from ancient Greek a place holy to the Muses (> classical Latin , : see MUSEUM n.), in B
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