I think a lot of that is because English borrowed (stole) lots of single words from other languages, but almost never the entire system of prefixes and suffixes that the word was part of. Languages that were more closed to foreign vocabulary, like French and German, are a lot more regular in this regard.
On the disappearing antonyms of “grumpy” words
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Re: On the disappearing antonyms of “grumpy” words
#12Some of them -- like peccable - are probably truly dead. But others, at least to me, seem obvious when pointed out. If I ran into "scrutable" or "wieldly" in a sensible context, I'm not sure I would realize they were archaic. A personal favourite "tractable" is still current but already seems to be fading away. Far more things remain intractable. I have sometimes written a word, and then stared at it, and been unable…
“Tractable” is quite common in computer science, often to refer to problems which can be solved in polynomial time, as in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobham%27s_thesis
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Re: On the disappearing antonyms of “grumpy” words
#13I think a lot of that is because English borrowed (stole) lots of single words from other languages, but almost never the entire system of prefixes and suffixes that the word was part of. Languages that were more closed to foreign vocabulary, like French and German, are a lot more regular in this regard.
True, though many of the examples in the article, are from Old English using English derivations. Rue, ruth, ruthful, ruthless. The middle two have been so long forgotten Firefox gave them red squiggles. We rarely use some of the Old English suffixes and prefixes productively, retained mostly in fixed forms. Core Anglo-Saxon roots had a large space of valid, or possibly valid, words: wield, unwield, a-wield, wielder, unwieldy, wieldy, wieldingful, wieldingless, wieldingfulness, wieldinglessness, wieldinghood, unwieldinghood, a-wieldingful, a-wieldinglessness, and so on.
The Old English equivalent of unwieldinghood would be something like, the condition of being unarmed or unable to control something, and I bet it had the same emasculating subtext it implies to my modern English mind. Perhaps not and maybe it would come to mean something like demilitarization, if we had kept it. Either way, we do not know as it is a long dead language without the abundance of sources like with Latin to cast light on the finest shades of meaning. 'Wieldingfulness' would be a noun meaning an abundance of wielding, close to but distinct from strength, perhaps implying confidence, and something one hopes the army has. Or maybe the Supreme Court's judges would have wieldingfulness; we still wield the law today and it could have come to mean mental adroitness and intensity, as to wield was also about will, not just physically grasping. 'A-wieldinglessness' might be incompetency at taking up arms, or holding a leadership position, or responding to a challenge, and perhaps suggests... slow on the draw, clumsy, flailing about? I think. Who knows? They are not real words after all; though they could have been.
Re: On the disappearing antonyms of “grumpy” words
#14Reminds me of Flight of the Conchords’ Hurt Feeling song in which they are trying to portray themselves as rappers: “Some people think rappers are invincible. We’re vincable.” https://youtu.be/EuJzSTNDUGI
There's also How I met my Wife published in the New Yorker 1994, which starts with
> It had been a rough day, so when I walked into the party I was very chalant, despite my efforts to appear gruntled and consolate.
Re: On the disappearing antonyms of “grumpy” words
#15Gruntled started out referring to pigs, in particular the little grunting noises they made when they were content. Later when it was applied to people it came to mean discontent, because people don't generally grumble when they are happy. So the modern return to 'content' is actually sympatico with its original meaning
Re: On the disappearing antonyms of “grumpy” words
#16Some of them -- like peccable - are probably truly dead. But others, at least to me, seem obvious when pointed out. If I ran into "scrutable" or "wieldly" in a sensible context, I'm not sure I would realize they were archaic. A personal favourite "tractable" is still current but already seems to be fading away. Far more things remain intractable. I have sometimes written a word, and then stared at it, and been unable…
Kempt is also still used fairly regularly (even though my iPad seems to think it is not a real word)… usually used as ‘well kempt’, like a “well kempt yard”
Re: On the disappearing antonyms of “grumpy” words
#17Some of them -- like peccable - are probably truly dead. But others, at least to me, seem obvious when pointed out. If I ran into "scrutable" or "wieldly" in a sensible context, I'm not sure I would realize they were archaic. A personal favourite "tractable" is still current but already seems to be fading away. Far more things remain intractable. I have sometimes written a word, and then stared at it, and been unable…
I use and see tractable all the time. However, the context is often "that's not tractable"
Re: On the disappearing antonyms of “grumpy” words
#18I like that some of them entered the language as negatives.
Re: On the disappearing antonyms of “grumpy” words
#19Some of them -- like peccable - are probably truly dead. But others, at least to me, seem obvious when pointed out. If I ran into "scrutable" or "wieldly" in a sensible context, I'm not sure I would realize they were archaic. A personal favourite "tractable" is still current but already seems to be fading away. Far more things remain intractable. I have sometimes written a word, and then stared at it, and been unable…
> To sneak" is an old verb which was regularized in Middle English along with the rest. Sneak, sneaked. For about ~500 years things could only have sneaked. Then in the late 19th century in America we start hearing "snuck" as the past tense. That's now standard in my dialect and is creeping back into UK English, even. It's irresistible sometimes.
Have you seen the Conan vs Jennifer Garner chestnut on this very debate: https://youtu.be/DTLU06IlPVo?t=190
Re: On the disappearing antonyms of “grumpy” words
#20Some of them -- like peccable - are probably truly dead. But others, at least to me, seem obvious when pointed out. If I ran into "scrutable" or "wieldly" in a sensible context, I'm not sure I would realize they were archaic. A personal favourite "tractable" is still current but already seems to be fading away. Far more things remain intractable. I have sometimes written a word, and then stared at it, and been unable…
Kempt is also still used fairly regularly (even though my iPad seems to think it is not a real word)… usually used as ‘well kempt’, like a “well kempt yard”
I’d like to see more of ruthful.