Occasionally, patients here in Kentucky, especially ones from the eastern part of the state, will tell me that something happens "of a morning," as in "Since I've been pregnant I feel sick of a morning." I'm not sure if they are really saying "of a morning" or if they are saying "every morning" with such a lazy drawl that it comes out sounding like "of a morning." Can anybody shed light on this phenomenon?
Hi Alex
Kaint talk bout Kaintuck, but I think this usage has quite along pedigree in (now archaic) English rural usage. Don't have anything quotable to hand right now though. I will watch with interest!
Well, do they lay the table? or set the table?
Wait on line? or in line?
The best thing to do is to ask-- NY'er set a (the) table-- when i first heard lay a table-- i had no idea what was being talked about (I was about 8 at the time)!
this one goes way back, before it became colloquial southrin (or wherever).
52. {of take up pages and pages :}
a. At some time during, in the course of, on.
App. taking the place of the Com. Teut. and OE. genitive of time. Now only in the colloquial of an evening, of a morning, of a Sunday afternoon, and the like.
... 1382 Wyclif Gen. xx. 8 Anoon of the nyŠt 1590 Shakes. Mids. N. ii. i. 253 There sleepes Tytania, sometime of the night. 1612 Acct.-bk. W. Wray in Antiquary XXXII. 214 Great thunder+and also the like of new yeares day following. 1657 Manchester Court Leet Rec. (1887) IV. 212 For buying and selling pullen both of one day. 1741 Richardson Pamela II. 149 Of a Thursday my dear Father and Mother were marry'd. 1741 C'tess Pomfret Corr. (1805) III. 178 Here the company meet of a summer's evening. 1830 J. H. Newman Lett. (1891) I. 222 My practice to walk of a day to Nuneham. 1831 Carlyle Sart. Res. i. iii, All the Intellect of the place assembled of an evening. 1899 W. J. Knapp Life Borrow I. 79 The father made his last Will and Testament of a Monday.
Periodically, I'll get funny looks when I talk about taking magazines... "take" has always been a standard synonym for "subscribe to" in my household, and it strikes me as odd when people haven't heard it before.
That first sentence really belongs in the Tom Swifties thread, doesn't it? Wrong forum. So sorry.
Periodically I take periodicals also.
I used to work in the periodicals section of a college library. It was my job to discourage anyone from taking them. It was policy, I had to keep the SI swimsuit edition in my desk and anyone wanting to read it had to sign for it. One of the more important aspects of my job, to be sure.
In England "of a morning" is standard, though not common, and is perhaps a little dated. It would be readily understood, and I don't pick it up as dialectal at all, though it might be more common in some regions.
"Of an evening he would go down to the pub and play darts." -- Or "He'd go down to the pub and play darts of an evening." -- yess, slightly old-fashioned.
Less commonly "of a night", "of an afternoon", but they're possible too. But "Of a Monday" doesn't sound right.
Phrases like "of a afternoon" bring to mind a specific setting ... early summer, in the garden, seated around an umbrella table, soft breeze, sandwiches with the crusts cut off, gentle conversation.
In that setting, "I love lazing around with friends of a summer afternoon" seems appropriate.
But change the setting and phrases like that seem out of place, old fashioned, archaic even.
How often do we change our words, and the selection of them, according to where we are and who we are with?
wow
I am not surprised to learn that the usage is from archaic (or nearly so) England. Much of the language and accent of Appalachia is similar to older English usages because the settlers there were isolated and retained their original language more through generations. Thanks to all who replied.
A good friend of my grandmother (grandmother's?) who was reared in North Texas always used the expression "of a morning" to express "in the morning".(I don't know where her parents were from.) My grandmother and her siblings, whose ancestors were from central Louisiana and Georgia, never used the expression.
I am not surprised to learn that the usage is from archaic (or nearly so) England. I'm from New York and I use it. One becomes archaic quickly, here.
I'm from New York and I use it. One becomes archaic quickly, here. In a New York minute.