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<DIV><FONT size=4>I have recently become aware of the term 'barrow ditch'. It
seems to be an American regionalism, confined mostly to the South; I'm told
that, in the South, it's pronounced 'bar-ditch'. It refers to the ditch
alongside a highway. A web search conclusively demonstrates that this is in
active usage. </FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT size=4>Oddly, 'barrow ditch' seems undocumented by the dictionaries.
I've compared notes with a few others, and about the only work we have
not consulted is DARE. </FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT size=4>The interesting thing, of course, is the usage of 'barrow'.
The older sense of barrow is that of a mound of earth, an artificial hill,
particularly over a grave: tumulus, kurgan. This sense is found mainly in
archaeological literature. The other sense is that found in 'wheelbarrow', where
it seems the device for transporting a barrow, a mound (of
something) has, through metonymy, become the name of the
device.</FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT size=4>Is 'barrow' being used to describe an elevated
roadbed? All good roads, of course, are at least slightly elevated from the
surrounding terrain, in order to ensure good drainage. One thinks of a
barrow as being a rounded mound, but something dike-like is not a difficult
semantic extension. I wonder if civil engineers, the kind that design
roads, use 'barrow' in this sense. I suspect this is an archaism.
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<DIV><FONT size=4>Comments?</FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT size=4>Mark Odegard.</FONT></DIV>
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