An Irish Diary

Dictionary Delinquent: a vintage year for ‘worsened words’

An Irishman’s Diary

‘Egregious’, and ‘prestigious’ – two words whose meaning has changed radically over time.

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Frank McNally
Thu Nov 18 2021 - 19:00

A surprise contender for word of the year, at least according to recent correspondence on the letters page of the London Times, is “egregious”. One writer nominated it on the grounds that it seemed to have become indispensable to opinion pieces in that newspaper. Another agreed, while arguing that its relevance to our times also included the fact that it now means the opposite of what it once did.

"Egregious" is invariably pejorative these days, used to describe people or things that are outstandingly bad. But in earlier times it meant merely outstanding, and was more typically a compliment. In its Latin origins, via the phrase "e grege", it referred to something "out of the flock". Hence its use in one of Horace's Odes to praise the great Roman general Regulus as "egregious exsul".

That’s an oxymoron, meaning glorious exile. The “glorious” was sincere, however. Regulus was revered in Rome for his stoic heroism and had earned the compliment the hard way. Taken prisoner by the Carthaginians in 250BC, he was tortured to death by having his eyelids either “amputated” or “stapled open”, so that, when exposed to direct sunlight, he first went blind and then died from lack of sleep.

In modern Rome, and Italy in general, the word's positive sense still lingers via the formal address Egregio Signore (meaning Dear Sir, more or less).

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But in English, egregious has gone down in the world.

Its pastoral origins still lurked in the first edition of the classic Fowler’s Modern English Usage (1926), except that instead of evoking excellence in sheep, that dictionary’s examples included “the egregious Jones”, which as Fowler explained, now meant that Jones was a “notorious ass”.

What happened to egregious in English is an example of something the same book called “worsened words”: the tendency of once-prestigious words to acquire negative connotations over time.

“Prestigious”, funnily enough, is an example of the rarer opposite tendency. That used to mean “deceptive, illusory, in the manner of a conjuror’s trick”. But as the 20th century progressed, it evolved to what it means now. In the process, crucially, it retained the posh French pronunciation, if not without difficulty. “Prestige” threatened for a time to go the same way as “vestige”, but has somehow held on to its Parisian accent.

More often than not in English, words go from having positive connotations to negative ones, sometimes gradually, sometimes not. Egregious has a slow descent. “Appeasement”, which used to mean pleasure or satisfaction until Neville Chamberlain made it a foreign policy, had a more sudden one.

Of currently prestigious words, I predict that “iconic” and “passionate” will eventually be used everywhere with scorn. They already are in this column. I have had to lift my unilateral ban on iconic, temporarily, just to discuss it here. But my friends in public relations tell me that clients still insist on seeing it in press releases.

The value of such investment in words may go up and down, however, and down is more likely. I foresee that in dictionaries of the near-future, iconic will mean “something of purported high value, which is in reality mediocre or worse”.

I also foresee the other favourite of the corporate world, “passionate”, joining it on lexicographical Skid Row. In the ubiquitous phrase “we’re passionate about” (food, the environment, fungal toenail treatment, etc), the p-word will in time come to mean something like “we’re paid to do this and have to sound enthusiastic about it, but as soon as we get a better offer, we’re out of here”.

Returning to word-of-the-year contenders, another Times reader’s nomination was “sleaze”, egregious examples of which have dominated British politics lately. And that’s an interesting one too, because its current meaning would have been unknown to the original Fowler and only in more recent editions of the dictionary has it been added to the “worsened words” list.

There was a time, not long ago, when "sleazy" was used mainly about textiles. It meant they were flimsy, so you can see the logic behind the word's fall into disrepute. As recently as 1990, a report in this newspaper referred to "sleazy material". No, the material in question had not been banned by the State censor. It was mentioned by Irish Times fashion correspondent Gabrielle Williams in her account of the National College of Art and Design's annual fashion show, and referred only to a dress made from chenille.

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