No luck on finding an old use of the word hyphen, but I did stumble across this:
Linguistics was first used to emphasize the difference between a newer approach to the study of language and the more traditional approach of philology. The philologist was concerned primarily with the historical development of languages as reflected in literary texts. The linguist tends to give priority to spoken languages, analyzing them as they operate at a given point in time.
http://www.m-w.com/info/w3/language.htm

Edit-- it was a shed-roof sort of structure, with a few windows, that closed up the space between the two other buildings. [lightbulb]
In other words, it wouldn't be all that functional by itself, but serves to connect two parts, thus making a whole.