I just used the word “excercise” on another Board. It turns out it’s a spelling mistake and the true spelling is “exercise”.
To me, the former seems more correct. Was it ever a correct spelling and just went out of use for the (probably) Americanization of the word?
Hey now, you can’t blame us Americans for every oddity you think you spot in the language. According to a few on-line dictionaries, the history of the word is:
Perhaps someone with an OED can add to this history, but it certainly seems to have come from Latin and then French without a “c” after the “x”.
‘i’ after ‘e’, except after ‘c’ (because there’s an ‘x’)
No, it’s pretty much always been just ‘exer…’ without the additional ‘c’.
However, pay no attention to the so-called ‘rule’ cited by Vixen_llama. It’s not a useful ‘rule’ at all since the number of words which comply are matched by the number that don’t (weir, aeileron, deity, feisty, heinous, neigh etc.).
I always think of Popeye when I see ‘excercise’ - ek-sker-cise
I figured the post above mine sufficiently explained that there was no ‘c’ after the ‘x’ in the word’s history. I was making a joke on the rule … ‘i’ after ‘e’, except after ‘c’ and only in words that rhyme with neighbor and weigh. … enter laughter here
I before e except after c when the sound is ee. That takes care of those nasty neighbours, deitys, weirs etc. Heinous would be a legitimate exception.
Maybe the word just reminds you of “excise.”
The English generally pronouce “heinous” as “hay-ness”. So that doesn’t break the rule. But “weir” is pronounced “weer”, so that does.