Abacot
Encyclopedia : A : AB : ABA : Abacot
Abacot is a word with an interesting history. The common definition given is "an ancient cap of slate worn by the kings of England, the upper part of which was in the form of a double crown".
However, the actual word for this item is bycoket. The initial occurrence of abacot was in Edward Hall's Chronicle of 1548, and occurred as a serious misprint. It was copied verbatim by Raphael Holinshed (Chronicles of 1577), and then by a number of chronicle and dictionary editors over time, and eventually appeared in the 1771 Encyclopædia Britannica. The origin of this word was revealed in the Athenaeum in February 1882, by the famous Oxford English dictionary editor, James Murray.
The chain of mistranscriptions and misprints leading to the "creation" of this word is reputedly:
- a "bycoket" -(World Wide Words describes the original real word as meaning "a cap or headdress with a peak both in front and behind, whose name derives from an Old French term for a small castle crowning a hill.")
- a bicoket
- abocoket
- abocoke
- abacot
External links
- ["Take our word for it"]
- World Wide Words[newsletter] addressing this word.
From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.