antedating "hobo" 1885

[Laurence Horn]

At 3:08 PM -0400 5/25/09, Laurence Horn wrote:
>At 10:11 AM -0400 5/25/09, Mark Mandel wrote:
>>"color" and "honor" do not follow the pattern <CoCo>.
>>
>>m a m
>
>No, and the ones that do all stem from stemless prefixes or from
>non-nativized loanwords, I venture to guess.  "Mono" is the clearest
>example, pronounced /mano/ (in the U.S.) whether it's short for
>"mononucleosis", "monaural"/"monophonic" (stereo vs. mono), or
>anything else.  And while (as the OED confirms) the slur "homo" is
>always /homo/, even if uttered by a British slurrer who would
>pronounce the full label with an initial /ha-/, the Latin _homo
>(sapiens)_ may be either /hamo/ or /homo/.
>
>LH
>
P.S.  The last part I now see is unclear.  I meant that the word
_homo_ 'human' (as in _homo sapiens_) is *reported by the OED* to be
pronounced in both ways.  I've only ever heard it pronounced /homo/
in the U.S.

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