If I give my friendship to someone, I’ve be friended them.
If I give my love to someone, they are be loved .
If I take away someones lice, they are de loused .
so why is it when ones head is chopped off, it’s called be headed?
Compared to the other uses of the prefix, it sounds more like they were given head (no pun intended!:D)
Why isn’t the correct term de headed ?
friedo
June 19, 2004, 4:24am
2
I’m still trying to figure out why you can’t be capitated , combobulated or fenestrated .
j_sum1
June 19, 2004, 6:47am
3
If you are benighted, you are inconvenienced by night-fall.
Maybe if you are beheaded, you are inconvenienced by head fall.
Otto
June 19, 2004, 7:06am
4
From the dictionary.com listing for “behead”:
Middle English biheden, from Old English behafdian: be-, away from; see be- + hafod, head; see head.
absoul
June 19, 2004, 7:49am
5
beheaded
adj : having had the head cut off; “the beheaded prisoners”
Describe?
I’ve wondered about this denotation as well, but the connotation of DE headed seems somewhat clinical or surgical, sort of like deboning a fish.
The operative usage of the prefix be- in this case relates to the privation of the head. From the OED entry for be- :
Forming derivative verbs with privative meaning ‘off, away,’ as in bedeal, benim, bereave . A very common use of be- in OE. and ME., prob. originating in words like be-shear , ‘to cut all round,’ whence ‘to cut off or away’; but no longer in living use in forming new derivatives.
Words such as befriend and beloved are using the more common usage of the prefix, and are much more . . . er, common .
moriah
June 21, 2004, 4:16am
8
Beheaded = Beware: head begone; bereft of head; head befell in a bedpan!
Becalm.