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Discussion Groups / English Usage / November 2006importuning every passenger for an alms
It is a melancholy object to those who walk through this great town or travel in the country, when they see the streets, the roads, and cabin doors, crowded with beggars of the female sex, followed by three, four, or six children, all in rags and importuning every passenger for an alms. Source: A Modest Proposal ( http://xahlee.org/p/a_modest_proposal.html ) ---- Note the usage “for an alms.”. Xah xah@xahlee.org ∑ http://xahlee.org/ > It is a melancholy object to those who walk through this great town or > travel in the country, when they see the streets, the roads, and cabin [quoted text clipped - 7 lines] > ---- > Note the usage "for an alms.". Why? The word was singular for centuries until some bozo mistook it for a plural. cf 'kudos' and many more.  SignatureJohn Dean Oxford according to American Heritage Dict and Oxford American Dict (on OS X), alms is a plural noun. Am not sure what m-w.com is saying. about kudos, AHD has this tale to tell: Usage Note: Kudos is one of those words like congeries that look like plurals but are etymologically singular: correctness requires Kudos is (not are) due her for her brilliant work on the score. Some writers have tried to defend the use of kudos with a plural verb, or even the introduction of a new singular form of kudo, on the grounds that these innovations follow the pattern whereby the English words pea and cherry were re-formed from nouns ending in -s that were thought to be plural. Perhaps the singular kudo would have to be acknowledged as a legitimate formation if it came to be widely adopted in the popular language in the way that cherry and pea have. But at present kudos is still regarded as a slightly pretentious variant for praise and can scarcely claim to be part of the linguistic folkways of the community. When writers reach for an unfamiliar Greek word for the sake of elegance, it is fair to ask that they get it right. Still, it is worth noting that even people who are careful to treat the word syntactically as a singular often pronounce it as if it were a plural: etymology would require that the final consonant be pronounced as a voiceless (s), rather than as a voiced (z). Xah xah@xahlee.org ∑ http://xahlee.org/ > > It is a melancholy object to those who walk through this great town or > > travel in the country, when they see the streets, the roads, and cabin [quoted text clipped - 10 lines] > Why? The word was singular for centuries until some bozo mistook it for a > plural. cf 'kudos' and many more. [Top posting corrected] >> > It is a melancholy object to those who walk through this great town >> > or travel in the country, when they see the streets, the roads, and [quoted text clipped - 13 lines] >> John Dean >> Oxford > according to American Heritage Dict and Oxford American Dict (on OS > X), alms is a plural noun. > Am not sure what m-w.com is saying. The Shorter Oxford Dictionary (on paper) shows both singular and plural usages, with the plural dated to 1557. I'm more familiar with alms used as singular without an article, but the SOD quotes Addison using it with one. Moral: it's no use appealing to modern American dictionaries in order to understand an 18th century Anglo-Irish writer. john (near Oxford) >[Top posting corrected] > [quoted text clipped - 24 lines] >as singular without an article, but the SOD quotes Addison using it >with one. This etymology appears to be consistent with alms having originated as singular (but what do I know?): http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=alms alms O.E. ælmesse, from P.Gmc. *alemosna, an early borrowing of V.L. *alemosyna, from Church L. eleemosyna (Tertullian, 3c.), from Gk. eleemosyne "pity, mercy," in Ecclesiastical Gk. "charity, alms," from eleemon "compassionate," from eleos "pity, mercy," of unknown origin, perhaps imitative of cries for alms. >Moral: it's no use appealing to modern American dictionaries in order to >understand an 18th century Anglo-Irish writer. > >john (near Oxford) SignaturePeter Duncanson, UK (in alt.usage.english) >> [Top posting corrected] >> [quoted text clipped - 34 lines] > alms," from eleemon "compassionate," from eleos "pity, mercy," > of unknown origin, perhaps imitative of cries for alms. OED's earliest cite is from c. 1000 AD - " Syle aelmyssan". OED notes that the final 'n' in OE began to be treated as inflexional and was dropped from the nominative. In due course, the final 's' on 'aelmess' was treated as the mark of a plural. In 1711 Addison wrote "A Beggar Man that had asked an Alms of him" and as recently as 1848 Kingsley wrote "Every alms is a fresh badge of slavery." SignatureJohn Dean Oxford > [...] and as recently as 1848 Kingsley wrote "Every alms is a fresh > badge of slavery." Dare I say something about tipping? No, perhaps not. SignaturePeter Moylan http://www.pmoylan.org Please note the changed e-mail and web addresses. The domain eepjm.newcastle.edu.au no longer exists, and I can no longer receive mail at my newcastle.edu.au addresses. The optusnet address could disappear at any time. >about kudos, AHD has this tale to tell: [Snip] This seems to be pondian. In my experinece, it's always treated as singular, and pronounced with an unvoiced "s". David Where I can get more of this kind of info, using of nouns, becaus eI`m preparing the TOELF test. dcw ha escrito: > >about kudos, AHD has this tale to tell: > [quoted text clipped - 4 lines] > > David alen Isenhart u#440483 my game: http://uc1.gamestotal.com/?tft=de53 |
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