Discussions about eggcorns and related topics
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Chris -- 2025-05-10
From Michael Quinion’s World Wide Words newsletter:
“Neil Reid found a news item in the Independent online for 14 March about two US detectives who were accused of acting as killers for the Mafia and who, the report claimed, were guilty of ‘abetting no fewer than eight grizzly underworld murders’. Bearly believable.”
Last edited by julane (2006-04-03 12:16:37)
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This was first noted in Contribute about a year ago by James Callan in a post dated 2005/04/27. It never made it to the Database—perhaps because this is the kind of case where it’s really difficult to distinguish between misspelling and eggcorn. I’ve rescued Callan’s post from a Google cache here:
“grizzly†for “grislyâ€: In a grizzly scene, Cornwall gouges Gloucester’s eyes out and Regan sends him outside the castle to wander until he dies. Cornwall, assisted by Regan, exits bleeding profusely.
“grisly bear†is also fairly common.
Last edited by patschwieterman (2006-04-03 15:20:12)
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Thanks Pat. It seems to me these people are using “grizzly” because they have heard the word “grisly” but didn’t actually know it existed or what it meant, so they assumed the word was “grizzly” (as in what a bear might do to you in the forest). However, I am brand-new to the eggcorn forum, so perhaps I don’t have a complete understanding of what comprises an eggcorn!
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