I thought it would be interesting to bring up some words that used to have meanings that they don’t have in modern usage. Here I don’t mean big million-dollar words like “ejaculate” (which used to be used in literature more or less in the meaning of “exclaim”, but today means, well,…never mind); I mean ordinary, everyday words that were used in ways that no longer have currency.
I’m thinking of two examples. The first is the word situation. There are 19th-century sources that use this word in the sense of a job position. For example, I recall an old newspaper ad where a young woman is looking for a “situation” as a maid, or something to that effect. Examples are also found in Charles Dickens’ Christmas Carol (1843): like when Scrooge says to Bob Cratchit: “Let me hear another sound from you, and you’ll keep your Christmas by losing your situation!” (I.E., he is threatening to fire Cratchit). Or later, this: “Bob Cratchit told them how he had a situation in his eye for Master Peter, which would bring in, if obtained, full five-and-sixpence weekly.” (I.E., he is telling his family of a possible (presumably entry-level) job opportunity to be applied for by/for his eldest son, Peter).
The second word I’m thinking of is accident. It seems like in the past, this word often meant any chance occurrence, and not necessarily an unfortunate instance of harm, injury or damage. So for example, the line from Gilbert and Sullivan’s HMS Pinafore, “That you are their captain is an accident of birth. I cannot permit these noble fellows to be patronised because an accident of birth has placed you above them and them below you.” (Perhaps that expression, “an accident of birth”, could be used even today, and not sound altogether outdated?)
Well their is the word “gay” that has had several meanings over the generations. Gay at one point meant lighthearted fun for most of its existence. Then (in the 60’s) it was used to describe being a homosexual and the gay lifestyle. In the 90’s (thanks to Southpark) it was used to describe dumb or stupid behavior.
Quite a range of meanings for a simple little word.
I’ve always found the drift on “terrible” and “terrific” to be interesting.
They both come from the same root referring to a thing that induces fear (cf. terror), and originally carried this connotation. Terrible was commonly used to mean something so big and overwhelming that it provoked a cowering reaction, like extreme intimidation; think “Oz the Great and Terrible.”
Now, of course, most people use it to mean “very bad in quality,” which is interesting. Though the original sense sort of survives in the adverb: if you tell someone you’re “terribly grateful,” say, it means “very very,” not “I am appreciative in a gross and awful fashion.”
Awful is another one that has switched meaning. It was originally awe-full, as in full of awe, and meant something like profoundly impressive. I am not sure when and why it switched to meaning very bad.
The original meaning survives when it is used as an adjective, like “that’s an awfully nice house”.
Just a little correction in terminology, “awfully” as used here is not an adjective, but an intensifier, I.E., an adverb that serves to qualify the adjective (here - “nice”) by telling us how strong the property represented by the adjective is in the given instance.
This meaning is not so archaic as you think. “Situations Vacant” was the standard name of the employment section in a newspaper in the UK when I was growing up (born in London, 1960s). I cannot find any online employment site that still explicitly uses the term, but if I switch my VPN to the UK and google “situations vacant”, Google knows to take me to job search websites. And there’s a movie from 2008:
The more general use of situation for job is certainly dated, but I’d think most people in the U.K. would understand what an older person meant if they used the word in this way. I’d be interested to hear if other Brits agree, we need an @ to summon the British posters on here.
Point taken. To be frank, I wonder if more examples couldn’t be found where a word that seems archaic to a North American like me might have more recent currency in British English. Indeed, even the examples of “situation” I gave (including, I’m pretty sure, the newspaper ad I remember) are all British.
It may just be my impression, but not rarely, when I hear a modern educated person from England speak, or read a piece of writing coming from the same, or from some higher-level British news source, I get the impression like the language is a little more sophisticated, a little closer to something one might associate with the time of writers like Dickens than it might be if it came from North America.
“The sense development has been extraordinary, even for an adj.” [Weekley] — from “timid, faint-hearted” (pre-1300); to “fussy, fastidious” (late 14c.); to “dainty, delicate” (c. 1400); to “precise, careful” (1500s, preserved in such terms as a nice distinction and nice and early); to “agreeable, delightful” (1769); to “kind, thoughtful” (1830).
If you read much Jane Austen, you’re liable to run across the word living, which meant, as I understand it, a position as vicar in the Church of England which carried with it some monetary income from the landholdings.
For example, here’s Mr. Wickham in Pride and Prejudice:
In other words, Wickham was expecting to get a job as a clergyman, but it went to somebody else. It later turns out that Wickham is lying about this–he actually turned the job down–but that’s beside the point.
It may be that this is another case of a word that’s still used in the UK but unfamiliar to Americans, but my sense it that it’s rather obscure these days no matter where you are.
And it’s still evolving. Tell someone you’re a “nice guy” these days, and a lot of them will be expecting you to be going into some incel type rant any minute.
Several used to mean “various”. You can find this use in the US Constitution, always in the phrase “several states”, so it survives in that context. That is, you’ll find some people use that phrase today.
There’s similar word meanings that only survive because they were used in some prominent work, such as the King James Bible. None of them occur to me off-hand, though. Maybe I’ll think of some later.
“Gay” has always meant “happy, joyous, lighthearted”.
It has nearly always had the connotation of being physically “flashy, showy, gaudy”.
In the 19th Century, it acquired the connotation of “sexually promiscuous”.
In the late 19th Century, it meant “working as a prostitute”, and usually described heterosexual females.
In the 1920s, homosexual men used it to describe male prostitutes.
In the 1940s, psychologists started using it to describe homosexuals in general.
“They will come on you in the wild, in some dark place where there is no help. Do you wish them to find you? They are terrible.” Aragorn explaining the Nazgul to the Hobbits at the Prancing Pony.
I’m inclined to agree, but I bet there’s an age cut-off these days. I think you might just mystify a 15 year old, say.
Not sure about the financial workings, but the rest is correct. It’s a word I would and do use, but then I’m fond of old words. As an aside, I would say that it’s associated often with the third son (#1 inherits, #2 is bought a military commission, #3 needs a living.)
Much as I would like to congratulate myself and agree, the standard of written English I see on this (American) board argues against this.
For myself, how about the word Punk? Shakespeare used it to mean prostitute, but it’s had a range of shady uses to get to where we are now. punk - Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Awful was originally aweful meaning inspiring great awe, either for good or bad. In researching which king called St. Paul’s Cathedral “aweful” I found out that the Royal Warrant called the cathedral “artifical” meaning artistic in design.
The closely related expressions “to make a living” or as a verb “enough to live on” are still current everywhere, I think?
It would be interesting to know if the sense in Austen’s era specifically implied a job that provided accommodation (somewhere to live), since the modern meaning just implies sufficient income (enough to live).
The specific expression “it’s a living” idiomatically means something that provides adequate income in a slightly pejorative sense that it provides enough to allow one to live, but little more, and perhaps entailing little enjoyment. Usually used in a self-deprecating manner when commenting on one’s own mundane or low status occupation, sometimes ironically about a strange thing you do that happens to generate income.
A little Googling suggests that this expression is used in a similar way in the U.S.?
Not sure if you were suggesting that the term, as used by Austen, had a meaning beyond a job in the clergy. I think, in Austen’s use, it is just about the clergy - that’s how I have always understood it.
Historically, parish priests in the Church of England consisted of rectors, vicars, and perpetual curates. Parish churches and their incumbent clergy were supported by tithes, a form of local tax levied on the personal as well as agricultural output of the parish. A rector received direct payment of both the greater and lesser tithes of his parish, whilst a vicar received only the lesser tithes (the greater tithes going to the lay holder, or impropriator, of the living). A perpetual curate held the Cure of souls in an area which had not yet been formally or legally constituted as a parish, and received neither greater nor lesser tithes, but only a small stipend in return for his duties. Perpetual curates tended to have a lower social status, and were often quite poorly remunerated.
Quite commonly, parishes that had a rector as priest also had glebe lands attached to the parish. The rector was then responsible for the repair of the chancel of his church—the part dedicated to the sacred offices—while the rest of the building was the responsibility of the parish. This rectorial responsibility persists, in perpetuity, with the occupiers of the original rectorial land where it has been sold. This is called chancel repair liability, and affects institutional, corporate and private owners of land once owned by around 5,200 churches in England and Wales.
