Eggcorn Forum

Discussions about eggcorns and related topics

You are not logged in.

Announcement

Registrations are currently closed because of a technical problem. Please send email to if you wish to register.

The forum administrator reserves the right to request users to plausibly demonstrate that they are real people with an interest in the topic of eggcorns. Otherwise they may be removed with no further justification. Likewise, accounts that have not been used for posting may be removed.

Thanks for your understanding.

Chris -- 2018-04-11

#1 2006-10-22 13:12:21

jorkel
Eggcornista
Registered: 2006-08-08
Posts: 1456

MESSAGER?? (messenger)

Google counts on Oct 22, 2006
351,000,000 messenger … 5,500,000 “the messenger”
6,150,000 messager … 20,100 “the messager”—eggcorn?

A “messenger” is one who bears a message. [ME messangere, fr. OF messagier, fr. message]. If “messager” were to qualify as an eggcorn, it would be in spite of the fact that it circumvented the etymological progression and got straight to the message, if you will. What I am questioning here is whether “messager” could be an eggcorn of “messenger” even though it shares the same etymological root. My inclination is to say, “yes,” but I would be interested in hearing other peoples’ objections—with their explanations.

Examples:

The Daily Nightly – MSNBC.comAndrea Connie is no Powell she is just a messager for Cheney’s orders. Don’t expect to see her do the job of a Secretary of State. ...
dailynightly.msnbc.com/2006/07/on_the_road_wit.html – 27k – Cached – Similar pages

Holidays and Festivals – Bahá’íThe Baha’i Faith was preceded in Iran in 1844 by The Bab (“The Gate”) who prophesized about a messager of God. This was to be Baha’u’llah who was initially …
www.shagtown.com/days/bahai.html – 9k – Cached – Similar pages

welcome to janey’s junk drawer: Group 3 – Respond by March 26/04I personally believe that it could also be a messager, a soldier, a traveler, or anyone who had to travel a long long way. He rpobably has been rushing …
weblogs.elearning.ubc.ca/lew/archives/006059.html – 9k – Cached – Similar pages

The_Lighthouse.txt(“OK, boys, get that message first and then shoot the messager! ... But eventually, Synopsys saw the wisdom in not shooting the messager and instead, ...
www.deepchip.com/articles.asp?post=The_Lighthouse.txt – 9k – Cached – Similar pages

HELLAS:NET – WarfareWhile Alexander was sieging Tyre Darius send him a messager with a proposal: ... He sents a messager after Alexander who immedeatly stops his pursue of the …
monolith.dnsalias.org/~marsares/warfare/battle/gaugamel.html – 17k – Cached – Similar pages

letter.htmlThe Hor king, `white tent king’, heard about her beauty, and sent a messager to `Ling’ king for her. Upon the refusal, Hor king sent troops to attack `Ling’ ...
cc.purdue.edu/~wtv/tibet/letters.html – 9k – Cached – Similar pages

Story: The Use of Empty CityHe immidiately sent out a messager to call General ZHAO Yun back whom he had sent to some place. Some time later the news of the lost of Jie-Ting came. ...
www.chinapage.com/xwang/empty.html – 7k – Cached – Similar pages

Last edited by jorkel (2006-10-22 13:35:16)

Offline

 

#2 2006-10-27 22:27:23

patschwieterman
Administrator
From: California
Registered: 2005-10-25
Posts: 1680

Re: MESSAGER?? (messenger)

I would actually argue that “messager” isn’t an eggcorn. I usually think of eggcorns as reanalyses—reimaginings—of the meaning of the original word. But “messager” is the opposite: it’s a reinforcement of the original meaning of “messenger” as “one who bears a message.”

It’s still a great find. We English speakers have a really strong tendency to insert (or delete) l’s, m’s, n’s and to a lesser extent r’s in longish words. There’s actually a bit of commentary on this over at the Database article on inherit/inherent:
http://eggcorns.lascribe.net/english/550/inherit/

It’s amazing how common this kind of thing is. You can pick almost any long, somewhat obscure word, insert a superfluous m, n, or l into it, and then go find examples on the Web. For instance, just now I randomly picked “tabernacle.” I decided to go looking for “tabernancle,” and sure enough, I got 196 hits. And of course that extra “n” in “messenger” seems to have gotten there through the same process.
—Pat

Offline

 

Board footer

Powered by PunBB
PunBB is © 2002–2005 Rickard Andersson
Individual posters retain the copyright to their posts.

RSS feeds: active topicsall new posts