Thursday 7 June 2018

Digging up the past

During my walk around Chester yesterday I not only found a Centurion but also a couple of people looking for more Centurions  amongst* the Roman ruins in Grosvenor Park.   Please note these people were officially entitled to be there and hadn't just wandered along with trowels in their hands.  And before anyone (Adrian) asks how I know that because their vehicle was the other side of the railings keeping the public from trespassing.



*(Interestingly - to me at any rate - the spillchucker doesn't recognise the word 'amongst' and offered instead 'monogomist'!  Perhaps amongst is now old-fashioned I thought but when I checked - Among is the earlier word of this pair: according to the Oxford English Dictionary, it first appeared in Old English. The variant form, amongst, is a later development, coming along in the Middle English period. With regard to their meanings, there’s no difference between among and amongst and they are equally acceptable. They’re both prepositions which mean "situated in the middle of a group of people or things")

5 comments:

  1. And perhaps it shows that we are amongst spelling barbarians that they would not put the word in the spellcheck dictionary!

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  2. I wasn't going to ask. I bet had you spoken to the centurion you would have discovered he was a mercenary from Saxony or some such place.

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  3. I wonder if it were those digging people's trowels who had disturbed the Centurion's rest, making him wander amongst the ruins of his former garrison!
    "Amongst" is a word I have been using for a long time (and been ridiculed for it a few times). I like it and shall keep using it.

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  4. I'm an amongster too, though selectively so. Only in good company...

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