2005 National Spelling Bee

The list of 28 words I will study in this and the next essay or two come from spellers 112-208 in the 2005 Bee. My ratio of "known words" or words that I could easily have figured out is growing as I proceed. Nevertheless, two observations seem appropriate here. The selection committee is choosing a larger percentage of words that are not in the OED because they are primarily foreign words and no consensus actually exists as to whether they are, in fact, English words. This reality will only intensify in ensuing years as more and more foreign loan-words "make it" into English. I am not just referring to French or German words; increasingly we will run across Arabic or Filipino or Indonesian words. Thus, the scope of what really is English is indirectly broached by this spelling bee. And, second, once you decide it is English, because it appears in the Webster's Unabridged, you have to make sure you spell it according to the dictionary spelling. More than one way exists even to spell a basic sacred text, like Koran/Qu'ran. Complexities and imprecisions lurk below the surface in a "sport" that seemed, at least from a distant view, to be as "objective" as mathematics.

Making the List, Checking it Once

Here are the 28 words from these spellers which I will examine. Actually, I think there are about 30 or 31 words here--because I got fascinated in a few more as I reviewed them. They are: telmatology, epilimnion, nasaump, tournasin, miliaceous, caixinha, buran, glima, isocheim, algalloch, carrosserie, fomorian, phytocoenosis, malmignatte, glochidiate, ecuelle, variscite, tempeh, erythrophobia, algesimeter, buisson, hircocervus, escopeta, grivoiserie, epitasis, acrocyanosis, lauan, fanon, trumeau, chenet, and armitas. The fear is taken away from most if we just take our time to get acquainted with them.

1. We don't want to get bogged down in telmatology because it is, in fact, "that department of physiography which deals with peat-bogs." Nevertheless, I ran across a review of the 1975 classic in the field of peat-bogs (can you imagine their conferences?) by F. Overbeck, entitled Botanisch-geologische Moorkunde. It is a 719 page book with 263 figures and plates (hm..bog at morning; bog when sun shines on it; bog next to Rouen Cathedral?) and 37 tables. The three "foldouts" are, we hope, foldouts of bogs. Well, you would think that with such a germanically-inspired four-pound book the whole history of bogs from Eden to 20th century swamps is presented, but, in fact his has the "specialized object of describing the mires of Lower Saxony and Schleswig-Holstein, which are generally of the raised bog type." I bet Rick Steves hasn't read his book in preparation for his travel guide to Schleswig-Holstein. As with every first chapter of every German treatise, we have a history. And so, we have a "history of telmatology," with pictures of the significant telmatologists themselves (guys named Findorff, Rudolf von Fischer-Benzon, Lennary von Post--hardly household words, I fear). Well, this book is just chock full with information on mires and bogs. Did you know, for example, that the three mire regions in NW Germany are: (1) the topogenous (azonal); (2) the ombrogenous; and (3) the soligenous (aapa and palsa mires)? An ombrogenous bog, for example, is dependent on precipitation for its formation and maintenance, while a soligenous one lives by the sun. Well, I suppose if lawyers can have conferences on "mold," we can let mire specialists talk this way. How, indeed, do people ever figure out, with so many things in the world to do, what they want to do? I think I have lived most of my life in confusion because there are just too many attractive things to do "out there." And that is without considering the potentially alluring nature of telmatology. Unwilling to become mired in telmatology, we plow on.

2. Epilimnion also comes from the sphere of natural resources, and may be defined as the "upper, uniformly warm layer of water in a stratified lake." Yep, that is what its name means. "Epi" is "upper" or "above" and "limnos" is a lake. The term was introduced by E. A. Birge in 1910 where he said: "I employ two new words in this paper...These terms are epilimnion, for the upper warm layer of water....and hypolimnion, for the lower colder water." Well, what do you call the thing that divides the layers of water? The firmament? Nah, that is in the heavens, according to Genesis 1. We need go no further than the definition of hypolimnion to discover it. A hypolimnion is the "lower, cooler layer of water below the thermocline in a stratified lake." Bingo. The thermocline is that which divides the two. Sure enough, a "thermocline" is a "temperature gradient, esp. an abrupt temperature gradient occurring in a body of water." Hm..Now we have a little confusion, because I also discovered a word metalimnion, defined as "the layer of water in a stratified lake which lies beneath the epilimnion and above the hypolimnion, in which the temperature decreases rapidly with depth. This term wasn't introduced until 1935, while thermocline goes back to the late 19th century. Well, all the kids were supposed to do was spell the word and not understand the world. But, actually, the speller got it wrong. Too bad.

3. For the word nasaump we are in Indian (i.e., Native American) territory, and the OED will have nothing to do with it. Nasaump is a term from the Naragansetts, from Rhode Island. I ran across an article entited "Algonquin nasaump and napopi: French loanwords?" in a 1945 journal. This opaque six-page article was no doubt written by a linguistics professor, and he spends the entire article spinning out sentences that no one, I believe, could understand. Nevertheless, he says that Roger Williams himself, Baptist Roger, in a 1936 reprint of a 1643 "Key into the Language of America" had this to say about the word: "Nasaump, a kind of meal pottage, unparched; from this the English call their samp, which is the Indian corn, beaten and boiled, and eaten hot or cold with milk or butter, which are mercies beyond the Natives' plain water, and which is a dish exceeding wholesome for the English bodies." Take that, Julia or Martha! I wonder if a meal of this delicacy could be called a nasaumptious repast? Probably not. A little later Williams calls nasaump a kind of thickened broth. I see I am straining your patience, so let's move on.

4. We will conclude this essay with tournasin, which the OED defines as "a knife or spatula used to remove excess of slip from decorated pottery when partially dried." The source quoted by the OED is Edward Knight's, The practical dictionary of mechanics (1874-77). It just happens that I found Knight's 1880 dictionary online, and spent some time poring over the thousands of terms which he defines. This dictionary is so complete and exhaustive (not to mention exhausting) that there are more than 1000 defined terms beginning with "t" alone. And, tournasin just happens to be one of them. I wonder how many of his terms are in and how many don't appear in the OED or the Century? I am quite sure that no one has ever done a study of the subject, and I can't say that it would be important, but I bet you would learn a lot about mechanical terminology 125 years ago. For example, if you wanted to know what a tourbillion was, just look here. If you wanted to know that the tortoise shell, technically known as the testudo imbricata, you would start with Pliny's Natural History and then read the small-print definition here. Well, tournasin is defined here as a term from pottery: "A knife for the removal of superfluous slip from the baked ware which has been ornamented by the BLOWING-POT (which see)." I think I will pass up the opportunity, but I am grateful for running across this 19th century classic. It will go on my mental shelf just after Overbeck's story of bog-formation in Schleswig-Holstein.

But I close with evident gratitude to the word-selection committe of the Bee, for without their longing for obscure words, I never would have broadened my knowledge even this little bit.

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