Eggcorn? Weary/Wary

[Arnold Zwicky]

On Jun 12, 2009, at 7:28 AM, John Baker wrote:

>        A building security email from our landlord today includes the
> line, "Be weary of people working in pairs, as most delivery personnel
> work alone."  Google indicates 332,000 hits for "be weary of," with
> the
> first few examples clearly meaning "be wary of."
>
>        Is this an eggcorn?  I'm not sure whether it includes the
> necessary element of reanalysis.  Probably some people do think it
> means
> "be tired of," but I would think most people would realize that's not
> exactly what the phrase means, even if they're unfamiliar with the
> word
> "wary."  Presumably it's also influenced by "leery."

Brians has this:

People sometimes write “weary” (tired) when they mean
“wary” (cautious) which is a close synonym with “leery” which in the
psychedelic era was often misspelled “leary”; but since Timothy Leary
faded from public consciousness, the correct spelling has prevailed.
   http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/wary.html
.....

it's hard to know what to make of all this, since spelling,
pronunciation, and meaning are all tangled up here -- and it's
possible that different people are doing different things.

arnold

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