Thursday, March 28, 2013

I Before E, Except...


Yesterday Toque McToque sent me this really clever quote:



Being a linguist, I immediately thought to myself, “Some of those words might be from German or French, so that’s why they don’t follow the spelling rule.” So, for my readers’ edification, I am including the etymology of all these “weird” words:

Feisty: from a Middle English word for breaking wind, which then referred to a small dog – not sure that makes a lot of sense, but whatever

Heist: alternate pronunciation of hoist, which is from Middle English “to lift”

Weird: a Middle English word meaning “fate,” from an Old English root meaning “to turn”

Beige: French, of uncertain origin, meaning the color of undyed fabric

Foreign: Middle English, from a Latin word (foras) meaning “outside,” via Old French

Neighbor:  From Old English neah “near” gebur “dweller”

It appears, with the exception of beige and foreign, that these are all native English words, so the “I before e” is not a strict English spelling rule. Perhaps the closest thing to a rule could be that if it rhymes with “hey,” then e is before i, but if it rhymes with “hee,” then i is before e. Please let me know of exceptions to this rule in the comments.

Famous Hat

3 comments:

Hardingfele said...

I appreciate the linguistic analysis and cannot add any witty examples of my own. Feign and feint but they are most likely French

I am also creeped out by the WV. I am afraid I will see my mailbox or my house number there at some point

Famous Hat said...

You are correct, feign and feint are both French. Since I have no idea what your word verification was (your name?) I have no idea why it creeped you out.

Hardingfele said...

Any WV creeps me out because it is house numbers and mailboxes (I mean pix of them), so I am afraid I will see my mailbox or my house one of these days.