A.Word.A.Day --paragoge

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paragoge

PRONUNCIATION:

(par-uh-GO-jee)

MEANING:

noun: The addition of a letter or syllable at the end of a word, either through natural development or to add emphasis. For example, height-th for height.

ETYMOLOGY:

Via Latin, from Greek paragoge, from para- (beyond) + -agogue (leader).

USAGE:

"Henry Peacham cites the expansion of 'vile' to 'vilde' as an example of the rhetorical figure paragoge."
Stephen Booth; Shakespeare's Sonnets; Yale University Press; 2000.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

There are 10¹¹ stars in the galaxy. That used to be a huge number. But it's only a hundred billion. It's less than the national deficit! We used to call them astronomical numbers. Now we should call them economical numbers. -Richard Feynman, physicist, Nobel laureate (1918-1988)

What they say

“Garg works in the great tradition of Wilfred Funk and Norman Lewis... Garg, however, is more fun.”

More articles

Anu Garg on words

“To understand a word, we need to learn where it was born, what paths it took to reach where it is today, and how it has changed along the way.”

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