Safire/NY Times (request re "grab ahold) (fwd)

Benjamin Zimmer bgzimmer at BABEL.LING.UPENN.EDU
Tue Apr 3 20:49:41 UTC 2007


On 4/3/07, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> What about "aloose," as in "get aloose," which is just as grammatical
> as "get ahold / get aholt" for me? OED Online has "aloose" only as an
> obsolete verb.

DARE's got it, marked Southern/Midland, with cites back to 1884. (And
it has "ahold/aholt" back to 1872.)


--Ben Zimmer

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