While yclept is not used anymore, apparently it appears every so often; the example Quinion gives is: “The caption under the photo of the unfortunately yclept basketball player just makes matters worse: ‘David Putz dribbles away...’ ”. [That is pretty funny! ] My logophile friend alerted me to this word which is the past participle of "to call."

Apparently the initial y was once the standard way of marking the past participle. Does anyone know why it disappeared? The form still exists in modern German, evidently, though Quinion doesn't seem to like it!

We mentioned this in the thread about inflectional suffixes a little while ago.

I'd agree with Quinion. Such archaisms are best avoided.

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

A word only ever used facetiously. Archaism belongs in carefully archaic styles. Definitely to be avoided.

The archaism yclept is not that past participle of to call; it is the the past participle of clepen (> Old English cleopian 'to cry out'). To clepe never made it into present-day English, but yclept stuck around sort of like quoth for 'says'. There's also ye for 'the', but that's a misinterpretation of the letter þ for a y which looked quite similar in script.

The inflexional prefix y- stopped being used by the time of present-day English. It is related to the Germanic prefix ge-.

We mentioned this in the thread about inflectional suffixes a little while ago.

Arnie, the silliest thing just happened. I went to click your link, and I kept getting, time after time, a pop-up box that says I must sign into the network first. I have never gotten that message in any form before. Was your link only to one of our threads? That is very strange!

I suspect, since the discussion was about "inflectional suffixes" (I remember the discussion), I was a bit lost in that thread and thus forgot the discussion about the y being used as a past participle.

Are there any other survivals of this old form of past participle? It would seem odd if yclept were the only one that happened to survive.

There are few other words beginning with y followed by a consonant, but in most cases the Y means the letter of the alphabet (YMCA; Y-axis), or the word comes from a foreign tongue (Yquem, a wine, from Chateau de'Yquem; ytterbium, an element, from the town of Ytterby, Sweden; Yggdrasil, great tree in Norse mythology)

However, I did find ylem (hypothesized form of matter existing before the Big Bang) and ywis (archaic for 'certainly, surely'). Also, yclept itself was spelled with an i in Middle English, iclept, so there might be similar surviving forms spelled with an i.

Anyone know of other survivals like yclept?

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I kept getting, time after time, a pop-up box that says I must sign into the network first.

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Doh!

Sorry, I pasted in the wrong link. I've edited the original post to show the correct link.

I han't know of any other y- forms that survived, but ywis ~ iwis 'certainly' fits the bill. Even though it's an adverb, it's from the past participial form of wit 'to know'. (Since the verb itself did not survive, it's hard to think of yclept ~ iclept as the past participle of a verb that doesn't exist.) Now that I think about it: enough ~ enow is a survival, too, but it's not a past participle even though it has a ge- ~ y- prefix. The cognate verb in German is genügen 'to suffice'. It is thought that the ge- prefix (in Germanic) was used both as an indication of the past participle and as a verbal particle related to com- 'with' in Latin. And, not to be pedantic, but I've always seen d'oh! spelled with an apostrophe.

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

Whilst not exactly a survival to modern English the Middle English Cuckoo Song includes an example:

Sumer is ycomen in,
Loude sing cuckou!
Groweth seed and bloweth meed,
And springth the wode now.
Sing cuckou!

Ewe bleteth after lamb,
Loweth after calve cow,
Bulloc sterteth, bucke verteth,
Merye sing cuckou!
Cuckou, cuckou,
Wel singest thou cuckou:
Ne swik thou never now!

Sumer is ycumen in

This shows one other verbal morphological feature, common in Germanic, that was lost between Old English and Present-Day English: there were two classes of verbs that took two different auxiliary verbs to form the perfect tenses: one (with verbs of motion IIRC) like cumen 'to come' took béon 'to be' and the other took habban 'to have'.

Bits of language at the beginnings and ends of words do tend to get reduced and finally to disappear. It's not that uncommon. As for g > y, it happens all over in English, e.g., géar > year, féwortig > forty, gé > ye (as a 2nd person personal pronoun). I took a look at the OED (1st ed.) in the ys and found all kinds of past participles, like ybleued, yborn, etc. The all tended to die out before the 18th century. For whatever reason, yclept, like the last war veteran (I hear there are only four US World War I veterans left) or the last speaker of a language, hung on and out for longer than its companions.

And, not to bew pedantic, but I've always seen d'oh! spelled with an apostrophe.

Funny, I was thinking "doh" was an English spelling of it because I have always seen it written as "duh!" I haven't see the apostophe.

Arnie, that is a wonderful poem. Thank you!

I believe d'oh is the proper spelling. It's not meant to be duh, it's creation came with Homer Simpson. D'oh is his common expletive when he realizes he has done something dumb or if something happens to him. It's usually accompanied by his palm slapping his forehead.

So, then, CW, how is it pronounced? I have always seen it pronounced, "duh," which may be why a lot of people spell it that way. I don't get the apostrophe. What is its purpose?

Homer Simpson pronounces it so as to rhyme with doe, a female deer. I always took it to be a contraction of duh and oh. I may have been imagining things, but I believe d'oh has made it into a dictionary of repute.

Duh is what Moose in Archie comics used to say.

The OED Online traces it to 1943.

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Expressing inarticulacy or incomprehension. Also (usu. mildly derogatory): implying that another person has said something foolish or extremely obvious.

1943 Merrie Melodies (animated cartoon) in J. E. Lighter Hist. Dict. Amer. Slang (1994) I. 672/1 Duh... Well, he can't outsmart me, 'cause I'm a moron. 1963 N.Y. Times Mag. 24 Nov. 54/2 A favorite expression is ‘duh’... This is the standard retort used when someone makes a conversational contribution bordering on the banal. For example, the first child says,‘The Russians were first in space.’ Unimpressed, the second child replies (or rather grunts), ‘Duh’. 1978 Washington Post (Nexis) 20 Aug. B1 A sergeant was standing there talking to the girl who's [sic] car had been hit, trying to calm her down. All of a sudden a city officer pulls up and he walks over to the girl, puts his arm around her shoulder and walks away with her. My sergeant was just left standing there, like, ‘duh’. 1990 J. BURCHILL Margaret Thatcher in Sex & Sensibility (1992) 216 Ten years later, her intellectual and social betters aren't laughing any more but staggering around like punchdrunk fighters. Duh..what hit us? 1998 Arizona Republic 7 May EV6 One reader asked why undercover police officers are running around with automatic weapons. Duh. Because the criminals have them!

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D'uh was originally dooh and the first citation by the OED Online is 1945. But it was popularized by Homer Simpson (voice by Dan Castellaneta).

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doh, int.
colloq.

[Imitative. Cf. OH int., DUH int.
Popularized by the American actor Dan Castellaneta who provides the voice for the character Homer Simpson in the U.S. cartoon series The Simpsons. The quotation below is his own description of its origin:
1998 Daily Variety (Nexis) 28 Apr., The D'oh came from character actor James Finlayson's “Do-o-o-o” in Laurel & Hardy pictures. You can tell it was intended as a euphemism for “Damn”. I just speeded it up.
Although the word appears (in the form D'oh) in numerous publications based on The Simpsons, the scripts themselves simply specify annoyed grunt (as did the very earliest). Unofficial transcripts of the programme suggest the first spoken use was in a short episode, Punching Bag, broadcast on 27 Nov. 1988 as part of The Tracey Ullman Show. Its earliest occurrence in the full-length series was in the first episode Simpsons roasting on an Open Fire, broadcast on 17 Dec. 1989.]

Expressing frustration at the realization that things have turned out badly or not as planned, or that one has just said or done something foolish. Also (usu. mildly derogatory): implying that another person has said or done something foolish (cf. DUH int.).

1945 T. KAVANAGH It's That Man Again (B.B.C. radio script: 8th Ser. No. 166), Tom: Yes, out of the nest-Diana: What nest? Tom: In those whiskers-Diana: Dooh! Its [sic] no good talking to you. 1945 T. KAVANAGH It's That Man Again (B.B.C. radio script: 8th Ser. No. 167), Diana: The man I marry must be affectionate and call me ‘Dear’-Tom: Oh you're going to be a stag's wife-Diana: Doh! Tom: Same thing. 1952 A. BUCKERIDGE Jennings & Darbishire xii. 183 ‘Doh!’ An anguished gasp of exasperation rang out loud and clear as Mr Wilkins found his voice again. 1989 Beano 11 Feb. 23 (caption) [Speaker is a man who is knocked against a bus stop.] Doh! 1991 Chicago Tribune (Nexis) 15 Nov. (Friday) H, ‘The movie had one good point: It wasn't the worst movie I've ever seen.’ ‘It was the worst movie I've ever seen.’ ‘Doh!’ 1993 HP Professional (Nexis) July 28 Along their long path ISO sort of missed local area networks and network management, which gave the market over to TCP/IP and related technologies. As Homer Simpson would say: ‘Doh!’ 1996 A. FEIN et al. Simpsons Comics strike Back! 14/2 ‘Look out, you dern fool! You're gonna cut off your...’ ‘D'oh!!!’ 1998 N. JONES Hollyoaks (Mersey TV transmission script) Episode 256. 44 Cindy: What are we doing here, anyway? Paul: Doh! Use your head, eh?

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Tinman

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

Thanks for that, Tinman. I just haven't ever heard people say "doh," rhyming it with "dough." To me, people say it as "duh," rhyming with "the."

I loved the [sic] in the OED. Yet, I hate to use "sic" myself because it seems rather arrogant.

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1952 A. BUCKERIDGE Jennings & Darbishire xii. 183 ‘Doh!’ An anguished gasp of exasperation rang out loud and clear as Mr Wilkins found his voice again.

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Since the Jennings and Darbishire books were my main reading fodder in the 1950s I feel sure that this is the source for my use of the word doh.