This week we'll enjoy some sounds, concentrating on the sweet sounds of nature.

poppling - the sound of rain falling on water

The sources give a variety of further definitions of 'popple':
verb:
-- tossing, bubbling, or rippling motion
-- tumbling flow over rocks
-- move like boiling liquid
noun:
-- the sound of boiling liquid

You mean...popple isn't the past tense of people ???


Je suis désolé.

psithurism - the sound of the wind rustling the leaves

A lovely concept, but a strange-looking word. I wonder if this is in any way related to the genus-name of parrots, Psittacus.

Wordcrafter, or anyone else who cares to take up the challenge - I need a word that describes, or could be applied to, the sound of salt crystals hitting a steel bath from a height of a couple of feet. It's not really a tinkle (not melodious enough to be a tinkle) and not a rattle (more pleasant to listen to than a rattle), and I'm baffled!

If you're curious, I have a new shampoo that contains rough-milled sea salt crystals (the large-ish ones - not fine-milled table salt)), and the sound of them hitting the bath as I massage the shampoo into my scalp is quite pleasant, but difficult to describe!

I'm almost certain that 'psithurism' comes from the Greek word 'psithyros', which means whisper.

(I've missed you guys, but I've been soooooo busy. I'll be back soon I hope.) I was very much a-mused by last week's theme! I found a lot I could relate to!

Fom the OED Online:

psithurism SECOND EDITION 1989 rare.

(psjrz()m) [irreg. for psithyrism, ad. Gr. --------- or ----------, f. ---------- to whisper.]

Whispering; a whispering noise, as of leaves moved by the wind.

1872 M. COLLINS Pr. Clarice II. xix. 218 Psithurism of multitudinous leaves made ghostly music. 1875 Blacksmith & Scholar (1876) II. 12 The wind wooed them with a whispering psithurism.


psittac SECOND EDITION 1989 rare.

(pstæk) [ad. L. psittac-us, a. Gr. -------- parrot.]

A bird of the genus Psittacus; a parrot.

[c1400 MANDEVILLE (1839) xxvii. 274 And there ben manye Popegayes that thei clepen Psitakes in hire langage.] 1881 Academy 1 Oct. 252/1 To him parrots are psittacs.


The hyphens indicate Greek letters that didn't transfer.

Tinman

plangent - 1. loudly beating or reverberating: the plangent wave; 2. lamenting, plaintive.

quote:

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A characteristic tone of plangent nostalgia is leavened by snappy, tart dialogue, quirky but surprisingly apt similes (one character is "as chinless and gloomy as a clarinet," another's eyebrows are "so plucked that they looked like two columns of marching ants") and aperçus that resonate with earthy wisdom.
- Sybil Steinberg in Publisher's Weekly, 8/6/2001, reviewing Niagara Falls All Over Again by Elizabeth McCracken

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bonus word:
apercu; aperçu - a discerning insight

Ros,

I don't have the word you're looking for, but I do have a word that refers to the ringing of a bell: tintinnabulation. M-W dates it to 1831. I read the word in a Steven King novel, and I looked it up to see if he was using it right. He wasn't. As I remember, he was talking about the sound of a flowerpot that "went tintinnabulating down a fire escape". I didn't think much of the word then, but now I kind of like it.

Tinman

[This message was edited by tinman on Wed Aug 13th, 2003 at 23:41.]

The Bells by Edgar Allan Poe

Hear the sledges with the bells-
Silver bells!
What a world of merriment their melody foretells!
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
In the icy air of night!
While the stars that oversprinkle
All the heavens, seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells-
From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.

"Tinkle" fits this weeks theme too.

"How can I tell the difference between a psithurism and a sursurration ?" Tom whispered.

We had an English master who, when the bell for the end of class rang, would swirl his gown around himself and say, "...do I hear the tintinnabulation of the tintinnabulum?"

To which we, little horrors that we were, would invariably retort, "...No sir, it's just the bell ringing..."

Mind you, I now realise from the perspective of half a century, that that was probably his only joke and he had doubtless been using it for the previous fifty years.

Richard English

My own introduction to this wordcrafter community was a long time ago when i subscribed to the "Word of The Day." When I saw the seven obscure words that Poe used in "The Raven," I jumped in. Whereupon Kalleh said, "Please stay!" So I did.

I enjoy giving "oral interpretations," and "The Raven" is my favorite. Currently I am memorizing "The Bells" in case I might need an encore.

I consider both "The Raven" and "The Bells" to be masterpieces of the poet's craft.

For a while I was tempted to use the recorded sound of the various Bells as accompaniment to the recitation, but more recently decided that Poe's work stands alone. His choice of words is sufficient in itself.

The poem embuliently overflows with onomatopoeia

Here's the second stanza emphasis added)

Hear the mellow wedding bells,
Golden bells!
What a world of happiness their harmony foretells!
Through the balmy air of night
How they ring out their delight!
From the molten-golden notes,
And all in tune,
What a liquid ditty floats
To the turtle-dove that listens, while she gloats
On the moon!
Oh, from out the sounding cells,
What a gush of euphony voluminously wells!
How it swells!
How it dwells
On the Future! how it tells
Of the rapture that impels
To the swinging and the ringing
Of the bells, bells, bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells,bells,
Bells, bells, bells-
To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells!

As long as we're talking about bells ...

ting - a light and clear metallic sound, as of a small bell
(verb: to give off that sound)

crepitate - to make a crackling or popping sound; crackle, as salt in fire; burning leaves or twigs

An Oklahoma court used the etymology of this word to conclude that where a statute provides special penalty for assault on a "decrepit" person, "decrepit" does not encompass the natural frailty and incapacity of an infant or a child.

quote:

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Webster defines "decrepit" as "broken down with age, wasted and enfeebled by the infirmities of old age, feeble, worn out." The Latin origin is the word "crepose" meaning to rattle or crackle; stemming from the same origin is the English word "crepitate" denoting "cracking sounds." ... these words are commonly associated with infirmities brought on by age and wear.
-- Herrington v. State, 352 P.2d 931, 933 (Okl. Cr. 1960)

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quote:

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I've missed you guys

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Oh museamuse, it is soooo good to see you back. We've missed you, too. Yes, we knew you'd like last week's theme!

A lovely word today, so let enjoy multiple definitions and quotations.

sough – [pronounced SOW or SUF] noun or verb:
- soft, low rustling or sighing sound
- moaning or sighing
- a soft murmuring or rustling sound, as of the wind or a gentle surf

quote:

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My ear, too, felt the flow of currents; in what dales and depths I could not tell: but there were many hills beyond Hay, and doubtless many becks threading their passes. That evening calm betrayed alike the tinkle of the nearest streams, the sough of the most remote.
– Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre, Ch. 12

Poetry is a form of writing in which the author attempts to disarm reason and evoke emotion, partly by presenting images that awaken a powerful response in the subconscious and partly by the mere sough and blubber of words.
– Pakistan Daily Times, Aug. 1, 2003

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Bonus word: beck - a small brook

We end the week with a lovely archaic word, for which I'm finding several meanings.

croodle - to coo like a dove
also: to cower or cuddle together, as from fear or cold; to lie close and snug together, as pigs in straw; also: to fawn or coax

Secondary sources give a lovely meaning not found in any on-line dictionary:
croodle - to snuggle, as a young animal with its mother; to creep close, as small children around a fire or chicks under the hen's wings

quote:

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...in those first heats of youth, this little England ...looked at moments rather like a prison than a palace; that my foolish young heart would sigh, "Oh! that I had wings" not as a dove, to fly home to its nest and croodle but as an eagle, to swoop away over land and sea, in a rampant and self-glorifying fashion ...
- Charles Kingsley, My Winter Garden

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