A Book About Words. G. F. Graham
than three or four instances of it in his poems. The precise date and occasion of the first introduction of ‘its’ into the English language have not been ascertained, but it was probably early in the seventeenth century. It is said that the ‘Rowley’s Poems’ of Chatterton was detected to be a forgery by the presence of the word ‘its’ several times in the MS. Rowley was represented as a monk of the fifteenth century, when the word was certainly not in the language.
New French Words.
M. Génin, in his chapter on the age of certain French words and phrases, mentions the following cases:[1]—
1. ‘Désagrément’ and ‘renaissance;’ mentioned by Père Bouhours as new words in 1675, two years after the death of Molière.
2. ‘Insidieux’ and ‘sécurité;’ established in the language by Malherbe.
3. ‘Sagacité;’ first found in the works of St.-Réal and Balzac.
4. The sixteenth century was remarkable for an irruption of diminutives, introduced chiefly by the influence of Ronsard and his school. Most of these are now lost; but two of them, viz. ‘historiette’ and ‘amourette,’ are retained.
5. It was Ménage who first used the word ‘prosateur.’
6. The negative words ‘intolérance,’ ‘inexpérimenter,’ ‘indévot,’ ‘irréligieux,’ and ‘impardonnable’ were subjects of much discussion about the end of the seventeenth century, and did not take root in the language till the eighteenth.
7. The Abbé St.-Pierre first used the word ‘bienfaisance.’
8. St.-Évremond discusses the word ‘vaste,’ remarking that it was then new, and not firmly established.
9. Ronsard first used ‘avidité,’ and ‘ode;’ and Baïf introduced ‘épigramme,’ ‘aigredoux,’ and ‘élégie.’
10. In the seventeenth century, the literati of the Hôtel Rambouillet produced several new words: Ségrais gave to the French language ‘impardonnable;’ Desmarets, ‘plumeux;’ and Balzac, ‘féliciter.’
The members of the Port-Royal also furnished their contingent of new words, which the Jesuits of course condemned as ridiculous and detestable. Among these new terms were ‘hydrie’ and ‘amphore.’ The first appears in a translation of Ecclesiastes xii. 6: ‘Antequam conteratur hydria ad fontem’—‘Before the pitcher be broken at the well.’ The second, ‘amphore,’ was used in a translation of Horace’s ode, ‘Ad Amphoram.’ But ‘hydrie’ was not destined to live, and has become obsolete; ‘amphore’ is still retained.
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