You also have the phenomenon which occurred after the Norman invasion, when a French/Latin word would be used alongside an Anglo-Saxon word. The most famous example of this is Cranmer's phrase, "We pray and beseech Thee", 'pray' being from French 'prier' (or the Norman-French equivalent) and 'beseech' from A.S. 'besecen', both meaning basically the same thing."
"And, sigh, we are still trying to get rid of the consequent redundant doublets -- and even triplets! -- which pepper legal writing.
Clear and unambiguous
Null, void and of no effect
I give, bequeath and devise
I edit the redundancies in materials which Judges use in their opinions, and I'll be damned if they don't put them back in more often than not. What, I ask them, is the difference between clear statutory language and unambiguous statutory language? A glaze covers their eyes; they don't even realize what they are doing; they just follow a habitual linguistic rhythm.
