Yet more angst of lack of words for X

[Jonathan Lighter]

In fact the 1621 example isn't English, but Greek.

Looks like the English word may have been coined in 1955 and the cyberworld
has recently discovered it.

Coined presumably because "Schadenfreude" was untranslatable in English.

JL


On Tue, Aug 19, 2014 at 4:42 PM, Benjamin Barrett <gogaku at ix.netcom.com>
wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Benjamin Barrett <gogaku at IX.NETCOM.COM>
> Subject:      Re: Yet more angst of lack of words for X
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Wiktionary (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Citations:epicaricacy) has =
> citations over the past decade, plus
> =E1=BC=90=CF=80=CE=B9=CF=87=CE=B1=CE=B9=
> =CF=81=CE=B5=CE=BA=CE=B1=CE=BA=CE=AF=CE=B1 in English in 1621 and a =
> mention of epicaricacy in 1955. (On Wiktionary, mention of a word is =
> treated differently from use of a word.) BB
>
> On Aug 19, 2014, at 1:06 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu> =
> wrote:
>
> >=20
> >=20
> > On Aug 19, 2014, at 3:37 PM, victor steinbok wrote:
> >=20
> >> This one a bit more reasonable than most -- almost contrarian to
> >> "conventional wisdom".
> >> =3D20
> >> http://goo.gl/X5jRD4
> >> =3D20
> >> The punchline should be revealing:
> >> =3D20
> >>> I'm still looking for one more ... a word for the mistaken belief =3D
> > that
> >> there is no English equivalent for a non-English word, such as
> >> Schadenfreude, which many people believe doesn't translate, but which =
> =3D
> > of
> >> course simply means epicaricacy. Suggestions welcome.
> >> =3D20
> >=20
> > "Epicaricacy", a new one on me, does show up via Googling with the =3D
> > relevant gloss, but isn't in the OED, and dictionary.com thought I =
> must =3D
> > have meant "epicranium".
> >=20
> > LH
>
>
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