else where, Jackie posted:

...in the latest AWADMail:
It was Milton, I believe, who coined a kind of antonym to "pantheon," namely "pandemonium"
http://wordsmith.org/words/pandemonium.html
the capital for denizens of the underworld and by extension, I suppose, it has come to mean the type of environment one might expect of such a place. Not that we say "pantheon broke out" or the like. :-)


i remember when i 'got' pandora. i knew "pan' and i knew dora--and when i suddenly realize Pandora's box was "pan" (all/every) plus dora (gift(s)) i felt like a fool who has been looking at a treasure and not seeing it.

and in an other thread, the book Middlesex (by Jeffery Eugenides) is mentioned.. one of the words used in the book, is Pantocrator --and while this is a new word.. well its easy to understand.

i know i could sit (as did as child) and read the dictionary for all the pan words, and make a list.

i am not interested in that simple list.. but it might be fun to learn everyone's eureka word --or one (or more) of their eureka words, since, (slow learner that i am, it took me a while to 'get' roots and meaning; and the way words are sometimes put together (and can be taken apart to learn meanings) i had several eureka words before i became a word nerd in earnest.

--re-reading, i realize i presumed everyone had the same or similar experience --my bad..
perhap the question should be broader.. what lead you to be word nerd? --was there a eureka moment? or did it come slowly over time?

OH, how I wish I had been able to take Latin! I did not know the meaning of either pan or dora; thanks, Helen. I guess my awareness was of the slow variety, as I became aware of the similarities between French and English. However, one of the earliest words that intrigued me was 'mystery', probably due to the fact that our local library had a small room just off the main part devoted entirely to this genre, and how thrilled I was when I'd go in there--I swept through shelf after shelf of them. The very word, to me, evokes: eagerness, thrill, puzzle, and...solution!

When I was a tyke, my nanny was an Englishwoman who had been sent to Norway to avoid the Nazi bombing of Britain. Ironically, she was there when the Nazis invaded and occupied Norway. She married a Norwegian fisherman and they moved to the United States at the end of WWII.

She read to me from English (as opposed to American) children's books, so I became accustomed to British spelling, British phraseology, and those British lexical choices which differ from those made here in the Colonies. Her husband taught me much about the origins of English words in Old Norse (as well as spinning some very exciting yarns based on Norse mythology).

How could a kid with such a background not develop an interest in the English language?

Errr, Jackie. Pan and dora are from Greek, not Latin. And it's not too late to start learning either or even both right now. There are some excellent on-line resources to help you.

Bingley

A moment I remember vividly from my childhood was reading a book called "The White Reindeer". A reindeer calf fallsinto the water and is described as "bedraggled", which I initially broke down as "bed-raggled". My mother corrected my pronunciation and explained the "be-" prefix as "all over" - all over draggled, all over spangled, all over whatever. The word "bedraggled" also struck me as particularly amusing - I laughed and laughed about it. Later I used it in my own children's book. Still a pretty good word!

A moment I remember vividly from my childhood was reading a book called "The White Reindeer". A reindeer calf falls into the water and is described as "bedraggled", which I initially broke down as "bed-raggled". My mother corrected my pronunciation and explained the "be-" prefix as "all over" - all over draggled, all over spangled, all over whatever. The word "bedraggled" also struck me as particularly amusing - I laughed and laughed about it. Later I used it in my own children's book. Still a pretty good word!

Thanks. Even as I made that post, I had a feeling I'd picked the wrong one of the two, which someone was kind enough to notify me of by PM. However, as with spunk (look it up if you want to), I refuse to be embarrassed about an honest mistake.

And--I wish others would continue this thread's theme: it's neat. Marianna's mixed emotions thread made me think of my response above, too: one word is simply not enough to adequately describe how I felt.

Egad--EC, you pipped me!

My Dear Mr Bingley, could you recommend a good place to start learning greek?(on line)

i noticed last year, reading--as i compulsively do--a label(on a skein of yarn) that i understood the greek (OK, so it modern greek) words for wool and polyester, and other components of the yarn..(D'oh--polyester is identical.. (well substitute pi for P, and so on.. but really the same in substance)

i would like to learn more.. (and will in a lackadasical fashion)

I don't know when I became a word nerd. I have a pretty good vocabulary from reading and taking Latin; I can't remember when I started liking to "read" dictionaries (high school or college?).

I did have a "eureka" moment once, though, with a dictionary that had the history of the words, you know, the roots back to Latin/Greek, etc. I looked up either Milky Way or galaxy. I got directed to several other words and finally figured out how we got Milky Way from the word galaxy! Even with 4 years of Latin in high school, this had somehow escaped me.

Anyway, it made some big impression on me for whatever reason!

Leslie

that's because galaxy is another greek word, not a latin one..

the greeks have dessert. galacto.....(galacto is enough to remember to find it on a menu)

its a 'milk (custard) cake' today, its more common to see lacto--as 'root' word for milk/(milk products). but galact or galax is also used (in the greek) and the same lacto (milky) word is at the root of galaxy.. our galaxy is the milky way, (and galaxy also means milky ...)

its like the round robin meaning played between seat and chair. with see (a religious group) and cathederal (the home church of biship, who has a chair, and is charged with a see... (with lots of connections i am forgetting the details of, right now)

i remember reading dictionaries before high school (i clearly remember the horrid summer when my dictionary reading habit was discovered.. i was trying that summer to 'fit in' and be normal. when it was discovered i carried a pocket dictionary with me.. well i was unmasked as a nerd.

Textkit (http://www.textkit.com/) has free downloadable Greek courses and a forum where you can ask questions.


There is also the Greek Study list where you can work through a course book as part of a group, doing the set exercises each week, and posting them to the mailing list, and also asking questions if you get stuck. http://www.quasillum.com/greek/greekstudy.html



Bingley

Well, that just goes to show how much attention I really paid to the derivation of galaxy, now doesn't it? sheesh...
Edit: forgot my name...cos I'm embarrassed!? - Leslie