DEAR RICHARD: While doing Civil War research, I often read affidavits regarding pension applications made in the late 1800s and early 1900s. A soldier supporting another soldier’s application might say they were “intimate in the military.” While the writer obviously meant “close friends,” the same comment today might imply a sexual relationship. For most of my life, the word queer was often used as a derogative term while today it is widely accepted and used, especially in the LGBTQ community. I wonder if there are other words that have gone from being unacceptable to acceptable, or vice versa. Carl Ingualson, Pacific Beach
In the year 1666, a great fire swept through London and destroyed more than half the city, including three quarters of St. Paul’s Cathedral. Sir Christopher Wren, the original designer of St. Paul’s and perhaps the finest architect of all time, was commissioned to rebuild the great edifice. He began in 1675 and finished in 1710, a remarkably short period for such a task.
When the grand project was completed, Queen Anne, the reigning monarch, visited the Cathedral, gazed upon the magnificent edifice, and turned to the architect. “Mr. Wren,” she pronounced, “this building is awful, artificial and amusing.” Sir Christopher, so the story goes, was delighted with the royal compliment, because in those days, more than three centuries ago, awful meant “full of awe, awe-inspiring,” artificial meant “artistic,” and amusing, from the muses, meant “amazing.”
Awful, artificial, and amusing are sparkling examples of three words whose reputations have slid downhill over the years. Human nature being what it is, we are prone to believe the worst about people, and this cynicism is reflected in the fact that word meanings are much more likely to degrade than to upgrade.
Sure, some words born into low station have come up in life. With the passing of time, certain positions have acquired prestige, which used to mean “trickery,” and glamor, which began life as a synonym for “grammar,” and with these changes, the words describing them have risen from the humble to the exalted.
Such are the histories of knight, which once signified “a boy,” lord (“loaf giver”), governor (“steersman”), marshal (“house servant”), squire (“shield bearer”), chamberlain (“room attendant”), constable (“stable attendant),” steward (“sty warden”), minister (“servant”), and pedagogue (“slave”).
In Geoffrey Chaucer’s Middle English, nice, derived from the Latin nescius, “ignorant,” meant “foolish, senseless,” and in William Shakespeare’s day politician was a sinister word implying scheming, machiavellian trickery. Although some would argue that politician really hasn’t changed very much, these words have come up in life.
For the most part, however, the reputations of words, like those of people, are quite fragile and subject to debasement.
An Englishman was served a delicious meal in an American household. Afterward, he complimented his hostess with “You are the homeliest woman I have ever met!” This was high praise in British English, in which homely means “homelike, good around the home.” But because it was perceived that women who stayed home were generally unattractive, the word took on negative associations in American English. A similar fate has befallen spinster, which, as its roots indicate, meant simply “a women who spins.”
The Greeks used idiotes, from the root idios, “private,” to designate those who did not hold public office. Because such people possessed no special skill or status, the word gradually fell into disrepute.
Stink and stench were formerly neutral in meaning and referred to any smell, as did reek, which once had the innocuous meaning of “to smoke, emanate,” as in Shakespeare’s whimsical Sonnet 130: “But in some perfume there is more delight / Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.”
Do you find my treatment of changing word meanings to be vulgar, villainous, boorish, notorious, egregious, smug, or silly? Every one of these adjectives possessed a complimentary or neutral meaning during the Middle Ages: vulgar, boorish, and villainous: “relating to the common people, or peasantry”; notorious and egregious: “well known, outstanding”; smug: “neat, trim”; silly: “good, blessed, innocent.”
The Greek philosopher Heraclitus once said that you never step in the same river twice. It is equally obvious that you never step in the same language twice. But why do we humans so often degrade the meanings of words by infusing unpleasant connotations that ultimately change neutral denotations of words? It appears that our species prefers to be more critical than complimentary.