Capricorn

[Page Stephens]

One of the more unusual misunderstandings of the meaning of a word that I have ever run across was from the mouth of an astrologer who appeared on TV in Cleveland, OH some years ago.

The woman read the astrology chart for the city and "discovered" that according to its date of incorporation or something else that it was a Capricorn. She then proceeded to say that this was the reason that it was such a staid old city since like a goat it would have to be.

The woman had obviously never even seen a goat and probably wouldn't know one if she saw one.

I looked up Capricorn in Webster's 2nd International and it did have such a meaning in astrological circles due to the date the constellation appears in the sky, i.e. during the winter. On the other hand my cowboy friend Glenn Ohrlin and I used to practice our roping skills by doing our damnedest to rope his pet goat from horse back or even on foot and the damned pet would invariably elude us by dancing around and hopping from here to there in a capricious manner, i.e. almost doing a capricole.

Anyone out there have any other example of ways that astrologers have managed to change the meanings of word into the opposite of what they originally meant?

Page Stephens