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Chris -- 2025-05-10
From a recent Merriam-Webster word of the day about “impresario”:
English borrowed impresario directly from Italian, whose noun impresa means “undertaking.” Impresario traces back to the Latin verb prehendere, meaning “to seize.” ... English speakers were impressed enough with impresario to borrow it in the 1700s, at first using it, as the Italians did, especially of opera company managers. It should be noted that, despite their apparent similarities, impress and impresario are not related. Impress is a descendant of the Latin pressare, a form of the verb premere, which means “to press.”
The misspelling “impressario” occurs in English about 2% of the time. Which suggests that at least some people are thinking “impress” when they say/write “impresario.”
Hatching new language, one eggcorn at a time.
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Which suggests that at least some people are thinking “impress†when they say/write “impresario.â€
That’d be me. Not to mention its imperial pretensions.
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Peter Forster wrote:
Not to mention its imperial pretensions.
Three cheers for the Himpress of Colney ’Atch!
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
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Crikey! Is that David in the wardrobe again?
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Rather in a Lunnon street, before the great city of War Drobe (in the far-off land of Spare Oom) was even planted.
Last edited by DavidTuggy (2021-05-22 15:47:52)
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
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