The Jeweller's Window

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30478, 27 June 1964, Page 5

The Jeweller's Window

Barmy or Balmy?

tspedally written for "The Press" by

ARNOLD WALL]

Some write it one way, some the other. Which should it be? This Question arises, of course, when either word is used to mean “wrong in the head,” “cracked.” I have no doubt that the proper form is “Barmy.” Two different metaphors are involved; “barm” means “froth on fermenting malt liquor, yeast,” and “barmy” means “frothy.” "Balm” means “fragrance,” “healing influence” and “balmy” means “soft, mild, soothing, healing,” so when the word is written “barmy” and used descriptive of personal character the metaphor derives from the idea of ferment, hence “flighty” and used often to appear in the phrase “barmy on the crumpet.” But when spelt “balmy” a different, idea is at its root, that of “soft” which word itself may also be used of character. “ Barmy” is the older, more correct and more expressive of these two words. Now how about the pronunciation? In ordinary standard English the two are , pronounced exactly alike - since the 1 was always

and the r became so when followed by another consonant during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. But although such an authority as Daniel Jones spells both, phonetically, in exactly the same way, the Oxford pundits make a distinction, spelling “barmy” with a followed by an inverted r. It is not easy to understand why this is done. Jones is undoubtely right in treating the two words in this way, Oxford seems to be harking back to the older and now discarded practice; the inverted r is only a kind of ghost or so I regard it When it it is final, as in “bar” it is of course pronounced fully as when it is initial but when it is final, as in “bar’ it is replaced in Sound by a kind of glide which Oxford, when using phonetics, represents by the inverted r. This is a delicate, difficult little question, individuals differ in their habit and so do regional dialects. It is enough to make a man “barmy” rather than “balmy,” isn’t it? J|