Discussions about eggcorns and related topics
You are not logged in.
Registrations are currently closed because of a technical problem. Please send email to
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
I’ve always known them as ‘willicks’ though generally they are called winkles. ‘Periwinkles’ is their Sunday best name, which is often rendered ‘pennywinkles,’ a reference perhaps to the price they once were:
Charles Dickens. Dombey and Son …. ‘I may be very fond of pennywinkles, Mrs Richards, but it don’t follow that I’m to have ’em for tea. ...
The Wiyot sued clam shells and dentalium for money. They also used periwinkle shells. But Cheryl called them “pennywinkles”, because a penny is money and so …
humboldt1.com/~bbn/trump2/trump_text.html – 26k – Cached
Birmingham Mail; May 21, 2008 ; Patricia McDermott; 62 words …...call him who used to come every Sunday with his horse and cart selling pennywinkles? ...
www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-84856428.html – 110k – Cached
1 May 2005 … so off I went to mother penny winkles brought myself a penny worth of winkles took them home, laid them on the table happy as can be. ...
caseyleaver.wordpress.com/2005/05/11/the-winkle-song/ – 27k – Cached
Offline
We have two periwinkles-the periwinkle that is a flower/weed of the genus Vinca and the periwinkle that is the Atlantic sea snail. The two words have different etymologies. The OED notes that among the many variations on the plant name are the eighteenth century “pennyrinkle” and the eighteenth century “pennywinkle.” Both are listed as Devon regionalisms. The snail periwinkle has eighteenth century variants “pennywilk” and “pennywink,” the first from Northumberland and the second from Kent.
It’s odd that two words for two quite different things should both end up with the same four-syllable spelling “periwinkle,” and even odder that both meanings should develop “penny-” variants at the same time. I think your intuition may be correct, Peter. The snail name was probably eggcorned first, using the price of the popular snack as a bridge to “penny-,” then the plant name followed suit, not as an eggcorn but as a misguided effort to keep two words in tandem that should never have been yoked.
Hatching new language, one eggcorn at a time.
Offline
Curious. And as a gardener whose produce is frequently ravaged by crazed mollusks, I’m delighted at the idea of a plant following a snail for a change.
Offline
Delving into the usual etymological sources turned up some interesting twists on periwinkles. It seems possible that the name “pennywinkle” is an eggcorn/folk etymology on the O.E. name for the snail, from the period that predates its assimilation to the name of the flower in the 16th century (aha! Palmer concurs). It was originally a pinewincla or pinewincel, from O.E. pine, perhaps from L. pina “mussel,” from Gk. pinna, for “shell-fish”, + Sax. wincel, for “corner” or “a bend in the road”, perhaps referring to the spiral shell. Wedgwood spun another theory, that the supposed Anglo-Saxon pinewincle was a “pinwinkle, or winkle that is eaten by help of a pin used in pulling it out of the shell.â€
The flower’s name derives from L. pervincire, for “to tightly entwine, bind”, presumably because it grows by stolons. Stolon growth proceeds by new lateral stems which themselves root into the ground, making extraction difficult. Perhaps the snail and the flower were wed and confounded as pennywinkles. If so, what does that make the word periwinkle for the snail? A folk etymology I guess.
Last edited by David Bird (2010-08-15 09:24:06)
Offline
While rereading the thread on Words that have fallen out of favor, I noticed that Peter uses the phrase “winkle out” to mean “carefully extract”, as if the prize to be captured were an escargot. The phrase may survive, modified, in wrinkle out, where it can be confused with “iron out”. I’ve chosen only the instances where “winkle out” might have been more apt. Not easy to separate, and who knows.
Finding the Higgs
“We’re trying to wrinkle out the principles of nature, to discover new things and to understand the things we already have,” said Begel.
The future of ebooks
There’s no use denying the inevitable, and it’s much more interesting and fun to see if we can wrinkle out the possible ways this hardware/software will develop.
True Crime story
Matt Baglio speaks to psychologists and detectives, as well as Vatican clergy, to wrinkle out the truth about this most Gothic of subjects.
Offline
An interesting one, David, for a wrinkle is also a novel skill or technique which only comes with experience and practice. The return-tripper conjures a metaphor based on the unlikely notion of folk evacuating sea- shells through the use of hand-held hot metal:
... volatile socio-cultural change , the lures of achievements & the final struggle to iron out the winkles of what was once supposed to be the perfect life …
No big deal, it just takes time to iron out the winkles.
It’s Medical Mechanica They want to iron out the winkles on your brain
Offline