Cato's Grammar Grumble

[Cato]

Souliger, the soul-bearer. Someone mixed English and Latin here. Wasn't the "solidus" a Roman coin the soldiers were paid with?

Yes, in fact our word "soldier," and the French word "sou," are derived from solidus, which was a fairly pure gold coin introduced in the later empire.  It was designed to stabilize the currency, and therefore the economy, whose money had been debased (i.e. inflated) by assorted emperors throughout the disastrous 200's.

[JBS]

Yes, in fact our word "soldier," and the French word "sou," are derived from solidus, which was a fairly pure gold coin introduced in the later empire.  It was designed to stabilize the currency, and therefore the economy, whose money had been debased (i.e. inflated) by assorted emperors throughout the disastrous 200's.

Do you know if it's true that Roman soldiers were at one time paid in salt, and from that fact ultimately our word "salary" derives?

[ritter]

One of the uses of the word solde in French means a soldier's pay.

And in Spanish, sueldo is a synonym of salary (in its modern meaning).

[Jo498]

In German "Sold" is still used as a term for the payment in the military and also (or close derivatives) for some civil servants.

Of course, the spelling problem was not mainly the "sold-" but the remaining part of the word.
(Spelling is nightmarish in English but I think it is sometimes easier for us who learned it as a second or third language because while studying the language we usually spent far more time reading than listening,)

[North Star]

Do you know if it's true that Roman soldiers were at one time paid in salt, and from that fact ultimately our word "salary" derives?

There doesn't seem to be evidence to support this.

http://kiwihellenist.blogspot.com/2017/01/salt-and-salary.html
https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/448865/is-the-etymology-of-salary-a-myth

[DaveF]

They come from The Fourth of August by Laurence Binyon, as set to music by none other than Elgar (the first of the three poems which he used for The Spirit of England.

The music being none other than a quote from the Demons' Chorus in Gerontius.

[JBS]

There doesn't seem to be evidence to support this.

http://kiwihellenist.blogspot.com/2017/01/salt-and-salary.html
https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/448865/is-the-etymology-of-salary-a-myth

Thanks. I suppose the most probable origin is that salt, as a basic part of the diet, stood in for the entire amount of a soldier's food allowance.

[Cato]

Do you know if it's true that Roman soldiers were at one time paid in salt, and from that fact ultimately our word "salary" derives?

There doesn't seem to be evidence to support this.

http://kiwihellenist.blogspot.com/2017/01/salt-and-salary.html
https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/448865/is-the-etymology-of-salary-a-myth

Thanks. I suppose the most probable origin is that salt, as a basic part of the diet, stood in for the entire amount of a soldier's food allowance.

I just happened to see this, so thanks to North Star for finding a trustworthy answer from a classicist!

As Peter Gainsford, The Kiwi Hellenist, points out, the evidence is just not there, especially since the myth depends upon a mistranslation of Pliny the Elder's comment.

So many myths floating around, so little time!  One of the main ones I deal with as a Latin teacher in a Catholic school: the myth of the constant persecution of Christians by the Roman government.  That did not happen: one of my Roman History professors had estimated the total length of official Roman Imperial persecutions of Christians to be c. 18-24 months.  Others have different estimates, but none are c. 300 years (i.e. from the Crucifixion to Constantine).

And more likely, it was local bigots who wanted to persecute the Christians, the Roman government being unwilling to stir the huge pot filled with religions from its empire!  The Romans were in general pantheists (vid. The Pantheon in Rome), and believed that Divinity, being infinite, could have an infinite number of manifestations.  e.g. In Britain, Celtic deities were paired with classical deities. e.g. Sulis, a goddess connected to a hot springs near modern Bath.   Sulis was paired with Minerva/Athena.

Pliny the Younger's famous exchange with the Emperor Trajan about anonymous denunciations of Christians shows that - under this emperor at least - the Roman government did not go around looking for a fight about religion.  In the Gospels, Pontius Pilate shows absolutely that he wanted nothing to do with internal disputes in Judaism!

And I have heard more wrong Roman History from priests on Sunday than I care to list!   0:)

Anyway...back to grumbling about grammar!   

[Ken B]

There doesn't seem to be evidence to support this.

http://kiwihellenist.blogspot.com/2017/01/salt-and-salary.html
https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/448865/is-the-etymology-of-salary-a-myth

I remember thinking that was a stupid way to pay soldiers, when I "learnt" that in third or fourth grade, or whenever.

[bwv 1080]

I really strongly dislike adverbs

http://jasonzweig.com/why-i-hate-adverbs/

Had a guy working for me a while back that could seemingly not write a sentence without one (and also actually used the word basically in every sentence he really spoke), used to drive me literally and completely crazy

[Cato]

I really strongly dislike adverbs

http://jasonzweig.com/why-i-hate-adverbs/

Had a guy working for me a while back that could seemingly not write a sentence without one (and also actually used the word basically in every sentence he really spoke), used to drive me literally and completely crazy

I like the word "seemingly" now and then, as a replacement for " s/he, it seemed. "

Yesterday I saw a great example of irony.

A truck went past me in the opposite direction on a semi-circular exit ramp of the freeway.  The side of the truck was garishly decorated with a sign proclaiming: "THIS IS THE TRUCK OF THE FUTURE!"

(I am not making this up.)

Within a split second when I looked back and focused more carefully, I realized that this "truck of the future..."

...was being towed!!! 

[bwv 1080]

I like the word "seemingly" now and then, as a replacement for " s/he, it seemed. "

Yesterday I saw a great example of irony.

A truck went past me in the opposite direction on a semi-circular exit ramp of the freeway.  The side of the truck was garishly decorated with a sign proclaiming: "THIS IS THE TRUCK OF THE FUTURE!"

(I am not making this up.)

Within a split second when I looked back and focused more carefully, I realized that this "truck of the future..."

...was being towed!!! 

LOL

Yes, seemingly (and its synonyms apparently and evidently), unlike magnitude adverbs such as very or slightly do add relevant meaning to the verb modified

[zamyrabyrd]

[Christabel]

I like the word "seemingly" now and then, as a replacement for " s/he, it seemed. "

Yesterday I saw a great example of irony.

A truck went past me in the opposite direction on a semi-circular exit ramp of the freeway.  The side of the truck was garishly decorated with a sign proclaiming: "THIS IS THE TRUCK OF THE FUTURE!"

(I am not making this up.)

Within a split second when I looked back and focused more carefully, I realized that this "truck of the future..."

...was being towed!!! 

Recently I was behind a truck with pictures of window furnishings on the outside;  curtains, blinds etc.  When overtaking the truck I noticed, in bold writing, above the front cabin "Blind Man Driving".

[André]

Columbia is proud to advertise this as a nonbeakable record (bottom right). Aren't records supposed to be broken ?

[zamyrabyrd]

Columbia is proud to advertise this as a nonbeakable record (bottom right). Aren't records supposed to be broken ?

How about non-scratchable or non-meltable? I get a similar twinge when reading "this is a permanent book" after 30 or so years going through the yellowed or even brown pages falling out of a hastily bound cover.

[JBS]

Motivated by a post from Facebook.
Are people actually using "chef" as a verb? As in "Norma's Diner has been cheffed by Harvey for the last ten years."

[Ken B]

Motivated by a post from Facebook.
Are people actually using "chef" as a verb? As in "Norma's Diner has been cheffed by Harvey for the last ten years."

Joe's Diner has been cooked by Joe for ten years.

[schnittkease]

My new pet peeve is the use of apostrophes to express plural subjects when they are (indeed) apple's and orange's.

[DaveF]

My new pet peeve is the use of apostrophes to express plural subjects when they are (indeed) apple's and orange's.

That usage has been a favourite of the literately-challenged in the UK for ages, to the extent that it even has a name - the Greengrocer's Apostrophe (apple's and orange's indeed, along with carrot's, potato's and such like).  I must say that on my sole visit to the US I wasn't consciously affronted by it, so glad to hear that we now seem to be wrecking your language for a change .  Greengrocers and others get even more distressed when they're dimly aware that a noun changes its spelling in the plural - recently we at work were asked to display a poster (not prepared by us) advertising "Abergavenny Libraries Reading Group" - news to us all that there was more than one library in our small town.