To own occupies a semantic field which turns out to be a Grimpen Mire
By Dot Wordsworth
No one ordinarily talks of the festive season
By Dot Wordsworth
If wicca rings a bell it is because of a sensational intervention into language history
By Dot Wordsworth
A surd number or quantity is irrational, such as the square root of two
By Dot Wordsworth
Whatever spick and span reminds us of, it is as an idiom with a cheery meaning of its own
By Dot Wordsworth
I was put in mind of lounging by video conferencing, which allows conferees to attend to their visible top half while wearing lounge pants below
By Dot Wordsworth
In 1920s American slang ‘wash up’ meant to finish something or somebody
By Dot Wordsworth
I started at the word gifting like a horse shying at a plastic bag caught in the hedge. Why didn’t I like it?
By Dot Wordsworth
Association football became soccer in the 1880s, at first sometimes written socker
By Dot Wordsworth
Once upon a time, the art of criticism had the name critick in Englis
By Dot Wordsworth
Scots has been used as a spoken and a literary language
By Dot Wordsworth
Ictus can as easily be applied to the stress on a syllable in poetry
By Dot Wordsworth
But how is it pronounced?
By Dot Wordsworth
As a label of approval, it dates only from the 1950s
By Dot Wordsworth
In graffiti form it is sometimes rendered 1312, from the place of the letters in the alphabet
By Dot Wordsworth
