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ve·loc·i·ty (v-ls-t) Am.Her NOUN: pl. ve·loc·i·ties Rapidity or speed of motion; swiftness. Physics; A vector quantity whose magnitude is a body's speed and whose direction is the body's direction of motion. The rate of speed of action or occurrence. The rate at which money changes hands in an economy. ETYMOLOGY: Middle English velocite, from Old French, from Latin vlcits, from vlx, vlc -, fast; see weg- in Indo-European roots Online Etymology: velocity c.1550, from L. velocitatem (nom. velocitas) "swiftness, speed," from velox (gen. velocis) "swift," of uncertain origin, perhaps related to vehere "carry" (see vehicle), or from the same root as vegetable (see vigil). speed:
O.E. sped "success, prosperity, advancement," from P.Gmc. *spodiz (cf. O.S. spod "success," Du. spoed "haste, speed," O.H.G. spuot "success," O.S. spodian "to cause to succeed," M.Du. spoeden, O.H.G. spuoten "to haste"), from PIE *spo-ti- "speed," from *spe- "to thrive, prosper" (cf. Skt. sphayate "increases," L. sperare "to hope," O.C.S. spechu "endeavor," Lith. speju "to have leisure"). Meaning "quickness of motion or progress" emerged in late O.E. (usually adverbially, in dative plural, e.g. spedum feran), emerging fully in early M.E. Meaning "gear of a machine" is attested from 1866. Meaning "methamphetamine, or a related drug," first attested 1967, from its effect on users. Speeder "one who drives fast" is recorded from 1891. Speedometer is from 1904, a hybrid coined with Gk. -metron. [The ancient Greeks & Romans knew what speed was, & yet no-one supposes they called it speed, whence it follows that speedo- & speedometer are barbarisms." [Fowler] [/size] **My question is: What word did the Greek and Romans use for speed if one etymology says (from Latin vlcits, from vlx, vlc-, fast[/b]) and the next (Fowler) talks about a barbarism?
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Carpal Tunnel
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that's from Latin velocitas, from velox, veloc-, fast (since we still don't have diacritics working)
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Yes, that's obvious in the post I made. But I asked about Mr. Fowler and his barbarism and such and this:vlcits, from vlx, vlc Was that ever a word? Vlcits? and vlx , vlc?
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Carpal Tunnel
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Yes, that's obvious in the post I made. But I asked about Mr. Fowler and his barbarism and such and this:vlcits, from vlx, vlc Was that ever a word? Vlcits? and vlx , vlc? No, vlcits, vlx, and vlc are velocitas, velox, and veloc- with the letters that were marked with a macron missing. And the veloc- was not a word in itself. It was the root without the inflectional endings. Velox was the nominative singular.
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Carpal Tunnel
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which is what I was trying to say, without putting in enough words.
-ron o.
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Fowler is talking about the English word speed being used with a Greek root meter 'measure' to create the word speedometer which is a barbarism. Like television mixes Greek 'far' and Latin 'seeing', etc. I guess tachometer had already been coined from τάχος (takhos), ταχύς (takhus) 'speed'. And Latin velocitas, velocitatis, 'speed'.
Ceci n'est pas un seing.
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My point of departure was vélocipède, but I wanted to check velocity first and got tackeled by Mr. Fowler's phrase and more which I did not read right. Thanks for the explanations. Velocipede is the classical word for bycicle. Literally meaning (latin} fast foot. In some languages vélocipède (or a corruption of it ) is the usual word for bycicle: Malaysian: Sepeda, Latvian: Velosipēds, Russian Велосипед. The French vélo is an abbrevation of it, just like in Flanders velo is often used.. Even the Dutch fiets is according to some a corruption of vélocipède. velocipede I was thinking the bycicle is still the fastest manpowered vehicle, though the invention of the automobile has made it seem slow in comparison. But then the automobile was never really automobile at all. If it really had been politics and history would have been quite different. Most countries have given the holy cow a different naming. Germany and Holland still call it 'auto' although some use ' Wagen' / wagen-(wagon).
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Made me think of Montgomery Burns...
"I'm sure the manual will indicate which lever is the velocitator and which is the deceleratrix."
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 Made me think of our car sales man. Same attitude. Ironically, the firm we used to buy our Citroën cars from was called: Le Velo.
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Lovely to see you, doc! Who, please, is or was Montgomery Burns?
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