Some Misused Words.
CYNCOPE is pronounced sin-ko-pee, with the accent on the first syllable. When used by coroners it means heart failure. That is not its real meaning, however. The doctor would say “ Cardiac syncope,” but coroners are busy m=n. Many years ago in Christchurch doctors used to take a fiendish delight in using long words at inquests. Extravasation was a favourite. It doesn’t actually mean bleeding, but that would be near enough for a coroner. Grammatically, syncope means an elision of one or more letters or syllables from the middle of a word, as ne’er for never, or ev’ry for every. Syncopation, grammatically, means the contraction of a word —Gloster for Gloucester. A correspondent asks whether “ averse to” or ‘‘averse from” is correct. “ Averse to ” is much the better usage, although “from” was used in the very early days. The use of “ to ” is strengthened by the case of aversion. Bacon wrote “ aversion towards.” Moreover “ averse to ” is more in agreement with the kindred terms dislike, hatred, dissimilar, contrary and repugnant. Duly affected persons nowadays write “ averse from.” TOUCHSTONE.
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Bibliographic details
Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 234, 2 October 1931, Page 6
Word Count
180Some Misused Words. Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 234, 2 October 1931, Page 6
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