[Ads-l] casemate ~ casement
W Brewer
brewerwa at GMAIL.COM
Fri Jul 8 03:55:13 UTC 2016
Wikip: << A casemate, sometimes erroneously rendered casement, is a
fortified gun emplacement or armored structure from which guns are fired. >>
WB: No nasal spread here. Italian <casamatta> being far in the past, this
obscure <-mate> looks like a [+human] homonym, leading to reinterpretation
as the high-frequency [-ment] suffix, as in <casement window>; cf. somewhat
semantically relevant <basement>.
------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
More information about the Ads-l
mailing list