May I stick my nose in to propose a word found while researching this week's theme? (At least, some respected authorities say it's an old word.) Answer to be revealed Saturday night (US time) as a word-of-the day, so let's finish this game by then.

The word is horsmander.* As a hint, let's admit that it's an eponym, and a verb.

Have fun!

*EDIT: Typo corrected.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: wordcrafter,

Wordcrafter-- I think this usually goes in Wordplay-- perhaps no one's noticed it.

I've sent mine!

Good spot, bethree. I've moved it; I know some people who don't read Word Games and follow the Bluffing game. In fact, the WG forum was created becasuse the frequency of posts to some of the threads was causing people to overlook the Bluffing Game.

Wordcrafter - I'll send you a daffynition as soon as I've thought up one. However, is it spelled horsemander or horsmander?

And I just now responded to Bethree's comment by moving it without realizing that you'd done so, thus putting it back into the wrong place. Corrected now.

Second oops: The word is horsmander, not horsemander.

Mine's on the way...

you have mine!

Six so far. Any more? I'll post tomorrow morning.

Sent you one now

And the entries are

1. to restore political boundaries to their prior lines without regard to population shifts
   
   
2. to delete from a list of recipients for a general communication
   
   
3. to base a full-length book on the records of one’s service as a public official
   
   
4. to wander around outside
   
   
5. to drink rapidly or in large gulps
   
   
6. to prepare or direct the preparation of hors d'oeuvres or other ‘finger foods’ for parties
   
   
7. to negotiate a heavy load up a steep incline, from W. A Horsmander, 19th-c. engineer who patented the first commercially successful steam-operated material handling system
   
   
8. to make a difficult choice by putting the question to the lot

What a great varied choice.

I'll have number two please.

If it were #3 it would be Horse Manure, so that's not it. I'll guess #4.

I'm present but not voting this time.

~~~~~~~~ jerry

I'll take a chance on #1, though I'm tempted by #7.

Wordmatic

#4, por favor.

No. 1 for me, please.

Only five answers. I’ve been waiting for more, but it’s time to reveal the results!

1. to restore political boundaries to their prior lines without regard to population shifts (from Asa; fooled wordmatic and arnie)
   
   
2. to delete from a list of recipients for a general communication (from Bob Hale, who guesssed his own daffynition to entrap others, but who snared no one)
   
   
3. to base a full-length book on the records of one’s service as a public official
   (The correct answer; fooled everyone. See next post for details.)
   
   
4. to wander around outside (from arnie; fooled Asa)
   
   
5. to drink rapidly or in large gulps (from Kalleh, who didn’t gulp anyone into her maw)
   
   
6. to prepare or direct the preparation of hors d'oeuvres or other ‘finger foods’ for parties (from JT, but not fingered by anybody )
   
   
7. to negotiate a heavy load up a steep incline, from W. A Horsmander, 19th-c. engineer who patented the first commercially successful steam-operated material handling system (from bethree, and excellent, I thought, but no one was pulled in)
   
   
8. to make a difficult choice by putting the question to the lot (wordmatic's choice, but didn’t get a “lot” of action)

This message has been edited. Last edited by: wordcrafter,

I took this word from a thick 2004 word-book. That book’s source, uncited but easily found due to similar phrasing, is a wordbook of 1952. And that, in turn, probably, comes from a 1909 journal-article that comments on horsmandering as an interesting new word.

• 2004: horsmandering. This old word would serve well today in describing the efforts of the many public officials, even corrupt ones, who write books about their experiences. Meaning just that, horsmandering comes from the name of an 18th-century American judge who was “on of the first public servant to use his records of a public experience as the basis of a full length book.”
  – Robert Hendrickson, The Facts on File Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins (3rd ed.)
  
  
• 1952: A political dictionary of the past reveals completely forgotten terms which in their day were fraught with meaning: Goose Question (slavery question), Silver Greys or Woolly Heads (Whigs),Democraws (British term applied to the French Revolutionists), Barnburners and Loco-Focos, Pewter Muggers (Tammany rebels) and Horsmandering (a term that could profitably be revived: Daniel Horsmander, an eighteenth -century judge, was one of the first public servants to use his records of a public experience as the basis of a full-length book).
  – Mario Pei, The Story of English
  
  
• 1909: The books have been multiplying ever since the end of the war; and now we have the word— "horsmandering." When a public official vacates his high office and then sits down to write the story of his trust and how he fulfilled it, that is horsemandering.
  – America [Journal of Jesuits of the United States and Canada]

But I can’t find it in any dictionary, or in any particular use. Query whether this is a real word, or just a case of one word-compiler copying from another at half-century intervals.

Well, arnie, that was an even exchange!

It gets zero ghits. It's not in Onelook. You've found the perfect word, Wordcrafter!

Must go dig out my copy of The Story of English and see what other treasures it holds.

Wordmatic

quote:

You've found the perfect word, Wordcrafter!

Why thank you!

regarding a "perfect word"; or, I smell a plot

This word really intrigued me, as obscure words often do. Here's an excerpt from a book review I found in the Winston-Salem Journal, Nov 20, 2005: (note initial spelling)

"Daniel Horsmanden, the leading interrogator and judge, was convinced that there was a vast conspiracy and pursued the accused relentlessly, partly to make a name for himself [EA]. Most historians have concluded that there was no giant plot, and that the trials and executions were the result of mass hysteria and the machinations of politicians such as Horsmander."

now, here's a biography and a wiki-article

coincidence? I think not.

edit: "Compared to Horsmanden, [Noah Webster] is a lovely man," said [historian Jill] Lepore -- also see Amazon, this is quite a well-documented conspiracy.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: tsuwm,

I love the title of the book he wrote mentioned in the Wikpedia article tsuwm pointed out:

quote:

The New York Conspiracy, or the History of the Negro Plot:: with the Journal of the Proceedings Against the Conspirators at New-York in the Years 1741-2: Together with Several Interesting Tables Containing the Names of the White and Black Persons Arrested on Account of the Conspiracy, the Times of Their Trials, Their Sentences, Their Executions by Burning and Hanging, Names of Those Transported, and Those Discharged: With a Variety of Other Useful and Highly Interesting Matter. (1741-2; republished in 1810)

With that title you hardly need to read the book itself!

Interesting. As arnie notes, the wikipedia article cites something called "The New York Conspiracy, or the History of the Negro Plot: ..." Would make you think that the authorities were accusing the Negros of plotting, right?

But wikipedia also cites "A Journal of the Proceedings in the Detection of the Conspiracy Formed by Some White People, in Conjunction With Negro and Other Slaves, for Burning the City of New-York in America and Murdering the Inhabitants." Very different impresssion.

Wonder what really went on. I get the sense that the author's original title was changed when the book was republished in 1810.

As to the author's name, ~mander vs. ~manden: As tsuwm as found out for us, many sources have the latter. But it's not all one-way: the New York Historical Society Library has the former (see here at note 29).

hard to imagine all those latter-day historians (to say nothing of the images of his book at Amazon) getting it wrong, though.

It's the dammest thing. Here's a book-cover with the same author-name as tsuwm shows (Horsmanden) but with the "White People" version of his title (look in the left part of the circled portion. Can't get the image to print here, but I can give you the link.)

Go figure!

PS: I think I've got it! The title was definitely changed in the 1810 reprint. The gent's name is spelled ~manden about 90% of the time, but you can find ~mander in old documents (even in contemporaneous ones), not just reletively recent ones. So it's not a recent confusion.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: shufitz,

I don't know what's up with that. Here's a link to the (1810) Second Edition, as scanned by the Library of Congress. You can also read the cleaned-up text version there. But the title, as scanned, seems to be identical to the First Edition, no?

The New-York Conspiracy

edit: no joy at LoC for Horsmander

This message has been edited. Last edited by: tsuwm,

Sorry, I wasn't clear. As best I can tell, in the 1810 edition is "The New York Conspiracy, or the History of the Negro Plot" (as in your last link) but in the 1740s edition the title is "A Journal of the Proceedings in the Detection of the Conspiracy Formed by Some White People". (Much longer in each case, of course.) But the one thing that is clear is that you're correct about the author's name.

Amazing, you can read the text!

EDIT: That text is the best cure for insomnia that I've ever seen.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: shufitz,

Out of a population of about 12,000 (which was about 5/6 white):

whites: 4 executed; 7 freed on condition that they leave the province
negros: 31 executed or burnt at the stake; 70 transported (all slaves)

Ugh. I am disgusted.

(source: tsuwm's link. Jump to image 385 and then "next-image" your way through the next half-dozen pages)