Tittle-tattle doesn't appear to be connected to tittle, it is reduplication of tattle - to
babble - from Medieval Dutch tatelen.
Roger
----- Original Message -----
From: "Roger Collett" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Saturday, December 31, 2005 8:22 AM
Subject: Re: For Robin Hamilton (1)
> As far as I understand it, the tittle is not strictly a diacritical mark in that it doesn't
> modify the sound of the letter beneath. It was first used in Latin manuscripts in the
> ??eleventh?? century to distinguish the letter 'j' from strokes of surrounding letters and has
> subsequently appeared on the derivative 'i' in English.
>
> But, of course, Ask the Profs,
>
> Roger
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Mark Weiss" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Saturday, December 31, 2005 2:49 AM
> Subject: Re: For Robin Hamilton (1)
>
>
>> And when the profs chime in, maybe they can tell us when the tittle began to cap the i and
>> whose doing it was. It's our only diacritical.
>>
>> At 07:02 PM 12/30/2005, you wrote:
>>>Has this anything to do with "tittle-tattle"?
>>>
>>>Roger
>>>
>>>I suspect it does, Roger, in that it would work like this: a 'tittle' is a
>>>small thing, whereas 'tattle' as in 'tatler' denotes talk, gossip, etc, so
>>>'tittle-tattle' is a lot of yak about not very much. And of course the words
>>>link in sound.
>>>
>>>this is all guesswork on my part, as I feel far too lazy to research it, so
>>>waiting for the Profs.
>>>
>>>Best
>>>
>>>Dave
>>>
>>>
>>>----- Original Message -----
>>>From: "Roger Day" <[log in to unmask]>
>>>To: <[log in to unmask]>
>>>Sent: Friday, December 30, 2005 3:09 PM
>>>Subject: Re: For Robin Hamilton (1)
>>>
>>>
>>>Has this anything to do with "tittle-tattle"?
>>>
>>>Roger
>>>On 12/30/05, Patrick McManus <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>> > Thanks Dave 'tittle'confirmed in my OED also tittling which has a
>>>charm
>>> > P tittling P
>>> >
>>> > -----Original Message-----
>>> > From: Poetryetc provides a venue for a dialogue relating to poetry and
>>> > poetics [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of David Bircumshaw
>>> > Sent: 30 December 2005 14:13
>>> > To: [log in to unmask]
>>> > Subject: For Robin Hamilton (1)
>>> >
>>> > Some disjecta membra that might interest Monsieur Le Rodent:
>>> >
>>> > 1) Daylight robbery. I came across this the other day: one assumes that
>>>the
>>> > phrase means something blatantly obvious and wrong being done in the sight
>>> > others, which is its usage, but its origin is quite different. It comes
>>>from
>>> > the Window Tax in 17th century England, when, of course, people bricked up
>>> > their windows to avoid the financial toll. Hence, it was not 'DAYlight
>>> > robbery', as we say it, but rather: 'daylight: robbery'.
>>> >
>>> > 2) 'ghetto' comes from the Italian for 'foundry'. This was because there
>>>was
>>> > an island foundry in Venice which, in the early 16th century, became the
>>> > first formalised 'ghetto' for Jews. That was the beginning of the utter
>>> > horrors (btw I can't, in this respect, recommend enough the late W.G.
>>> > Sebald's great novel 'Austerlitz')
>>> >
>>> > 3) The word for the little dot over a lower-case i is apparently a
>>>'tittle'.
>>> > I haven't investigated the accuracy of this but I hope it's true.
>>> >
>>> > Best
>>> >
>>> > Dave
>>> >
>>>
>>>
>>>--
>>>http://www.badstep.net/
>>>http://www.cb1poetry.org.uk/
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