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We've had an interesting discussion on Werewolves, but I think I alone have used the correct spelling, others perhaps lacking an extra e on their keyboards. I'm surprised that Mr Crockett (Doctor Pedanticus) hasn't picked you up on this. Are you mellowing, Crockers? Actually I see that the dictionary allows the spelling without the second e, so I retract. The word is formed from OE wer, a man + wulf, a wolf. Like Latin and Greek, OE has two words for man, wer (cognate with Latin vir) which means a male person, a man as opposed to a woman, and mann, a human being of either sex, cognate with Latin homo (not obviously cognate, but if you consider the accusative ho-min-em or the adjective hu-man-us, you see the resemblance). It has sometimes occurred to me during the controversies about inclusive language that some of the difficulties might have been circumvented if we had resurrected the word 'wer' when wishing to refer to males, and kept 'man' in its former unisex sense - a sense which it retains, actually, in the North East; I have often heard Sunderland women referring to each other as 'man' which sounds a little odd to a southern ear. :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) Doctor Elasticus. ____________________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get your free @yahoo.co.uk address at http://mail.yahoo.co.uk or your free @yahoo.ie address at http://mail.yahoo.ie %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%