Eggcorn Forum

On a different thread, I mentioned a couple mnemonics that I used to assist with spelling (even if the particular examples proved to be less than successful). This got me thinking whether some mnemonics might be a source of eggcorns. No particular examples come to mind, but I thought we might want to explore this avenue.

We can talk about mnemonics which incorporate etymology if there’s any interest—particularly if the departure from the etymology might lead to misinterpretations of a word’s current meaning—but I really wanted to focus on mnemonics that have no (historical) connection to the true meaning of the word.

Some of the mnemonics we might consider are those which possess imagery—since eggcorn involve a shift of imagery. Just to toss out a concrete example I’ll mention a common mnemonic which assists with the spelling of piece: piece of pie. It would seem ludicrous for someone to believe that the word piece might derive from the word pie, but perhaps we can identify other examples where a mnemonic might actually create such an impression.

So, I just want to toss this idea out there and invite other to pose some viable examples. They need not be eggcorns per se … just mnemonics with imagery. (Or perhaps there are eggcorns we’ve already mentioned that might tie in to this discussion). But let’s just see if anything interesting comes from this approach.