The Jeweller’s Window Tomahto, Tomayto

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30028, 12 January 1963, Page 8

The Jeweller’s Window Tomahto, Tomayto

[Speciallv Written for "The Press” bp ARNOLD WALL]

AS we all know, Americans say “tomayto” but Englishmen, and speakers of English generally, say “tomahto.” To explain why this is so we have to look, at the history of the word and of the fruit in the United States and in England. The word appeared in English first in 1604 in a History of the Ipdies—“Tomatoes, which is a great, sappy and savourie graine”—but it did not come into use as a food till about 1830 in the United States and a good deal later in England. Though now so very popular and so highly valued, it was not much liked in earlier days; one account says that it was eaten only by “Jews and foreigners.” Hence it did not appear in the older dictionaries at all: I doubt whether any included it before the American Webster, 1828. The early form was "tomate”—the spelling with a final “o” appeared first in 1753, and was adopted in English as representing the original Spanish form. Why, then, do the Americans prefer “tomayto” while we say “tomahto,” for both of us say “potayto?” The reason seems to be that the Americans were the first to popularise the fruit and that they anglicised it (or, if you like, Americanised it) just as they (and we) anglicised “potato.” We, adopting the fruit, much later, as an article of diet, still keep it in its "foreign” pronunciation. I may add, though it should not be necessary to do so, that English is, the only

language in which long “a” is pronounced as the diphthong “ei” (as in veil), its “universal” value is “ah” as in “rather” and as whenever it occurs in, say, Maori, Welsh and Italian. So that is why we say that in “tomayto” the "a" has been “anglicised” in pronunciation. I may also say that I am in the minority as being no lover of the tomato and that I am rather puzzled by its sudden upsurge into popularity after centuries of coldshouldering and neglect Has the modern palate really changed? Psychic I am not one of those fortunate people (are they fortunate?) who are called psychic or clairvoyant, or have the gift of second-sight, but I recently had an experience of coincidence which Kerns to border on the occult. While taking my usual siesta I allowed my mind to drift at its own will, as usual, and it strayed in to the subject of words spelt with either S or C and it quickly listed “celery,” “sentinel” and “cider” which have or have had the alternative forms “selery,” “centinel” and “sider.” While this was going on the telephone rang and was answered by my housekeeper; I did not hear it. An enquirer had rung to ask me whether “sill’ or “cill” was the correct spelling in “win-ttaw-eiU.” It wag surprising enough to learn that anybody had asked this question, but atill more so to know that I was thinking (if you can call it thinking) about it at the moment when he asked it Telepathy, clairvoyance or what? Chestnuts Stories, like insects and worms, have life histories; they are bom, they flourish, they become “chestnuts” and they die. But, unlike the natural livers, they may come to life again after a longer or a shorter interval So you may tell an old story without toe cry of "chestnut” if it is old enough to have been unknown to your generation; it then takes on a new lease of life.

Some stories I could mention have continued to be told, with intervals of a sort of hibernation, for at least 400 years. So here are three specimens of curious English, all well known 80 years ago or more, but not all widely familiar to the present generation and therefore not always treated as “chestnuts.” The first illustrates "The English Negative.” A workman comes up to his mates in toe dinner hour: “Ain’t* none o’ you chaps seen no pipe lying about in none o’ these 'ere sheds NOWHERE?”

The second story illustrates toe aitchlessness of the Cockney (and allied) speech: "it isn't toe ’untin’ Sir tow ’urts the ’oraes ’oofs, it’s the sra ■sna.-r" - Th« last Uhistratee tool

peculiar West Country grammar, the nominative and objective cases reversed: a woman calls to some children on a beach and tells them that their mother is calling them. One of the children replies " ’er bain’t a-caiLlin’ o’ we, us doan’t belong to she.”

! If any one of these three ■ stories be now told the , chances are that somebody > will know it, probably some i antique like myself; but if ; some really old story be re- > constructed, one, for instance, • from the C Mery Talys of 1525, or from Mery Tales and Quick Answers about 1535, then it will pretty certainly be new to the listeners. On I one occasion I dined with a ; company of five or six mem- , bers of a club and one who I knew me well advised the > others not to tell stories as I i would probably tell any nar- * rator that his story was huni dreds of years old. One ; elderly man, a Scottish resi- ’ dent in this country, took the i risk and told a story which I . identified as a favourite in ■ the sixteenth century. You may guess why this story . should have continued to be i told for 400 yean—l didn’t ; find it very funny myself. The ; modem version, done into Soots, runs like this: a tedious preacher runs through the whole list of the Old Testaments prophets with a comment on each . and when he comes to Micah he says “Now where shall we place Micah?” One of the congregation says “He can hae ma place, ah’m awa* tae ma hame.” You don’t crack your ribs over that, do you? Yet it did and probably does still hang on to life.

A Washington haberdasher •ends out packets of Instant coffee with his sales •nuounowneote in hopes that toe neoptente will brew the Muff ana read about fata barin a relaxed frame of