#80157
09/09/2002 10:51 PM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 10,542 |
I received an email today from a woman asking about the word 'dunsicall'; she writes: "I found it in C.S. Lewis' That Hideous Strength. The portion of the sentance is "...utterly to be renounced and abominated as a galli-maufrey of papistry, gentilism, lewdness and dunsicall folly."" it appears to be an early variant of the now rare 'duncical' - of or pertaining to a dunce; dull-witted, stupid, blockheaded. all well and good, but this led me to the etymology of the word dunce (duns): An application of the name of John Duns Scotus, the celebrated scholastic theologian, called ‘Doctor Subtilis’ the Subtle Doctor, who died in 1308. His works on theology, philosophy, and logic, were textbooks in the Universities, in which (as at Oxford) his followers, called Scotists, were a predominating Scholastic sect, until the 16th c., when the system was attacked with ridicule, first by the humanists, and then by the reformers, as a farrago of needless entities, and useless distinctions. The Dunsmen or Dunses, on their side, railed against the ‘new learning’, and the name Duns or Dunce, already synonymous with ‘cavilling sophist’ or ‘hair-splitter’, soon passed into the sense of ‘dull obstinate person impervious to the new learning’, and of ‘blockhead incapable of learning or scholarship’.[E.A.] so it's a short step from 'hair-splitter' to 'blockhead'.. 
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#80158
09/09/2002 10:58 PM
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Joined: Nov 2001
Posts: 279
enthusiast
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enthusiast
Joined: Nov 2001
Posts: 279 |
Howya tsuwm
Fer once in me life I knew somethin - that about the dunce I mean. I think he was Scottish but somewhere along the line I'm convinced he's actually Irish. Can't know why really - it's a sorta block I suppose. But that doesn't make me a block-head, does it?
be seein ya
GT
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#80159
09/09/2002 11:35 PM
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Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 13,858 |
I was looking for some samples of scolasticim, and by accident found this, which I enjoyed. http://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/angelpin.htmAn amusing account of how a student subtly sassed the prof.
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#80160
09/10/2002 12:09 AM
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Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I found that John Duns Scotus was from Duns, Berwickshire. He was very highly
regarded as a scholar, and is currently called "Venerable" by the Catholic Church
which may be preliminary to his being sanctified for his defense of the doctrine
of the Immaculate Conception.
Only much later when the humanists ridiculed his followers did "dunce" come
to mean stupid.
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#80161
09/10/2002 1:00 AM
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Joined: Nov 2001
Posts: 279
enthusiast
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enthusiast
Joined: Nov 2001
Posts: 279 |
Howya wwh
Born in Scotland in 1266. Died in 1308. That's accorden ta me tesasaurus.
GT
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#80162
09/10/2002 12:57 PM
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Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 11,613
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 11,613 |
it's a short step from 'hair-splitter' to 'blockhead'..
Now why am I blushing? :-)
Would it be correct to say that dunce is an eponym?
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#80163
09/11/2002 2:08 PM
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Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 320
enthusiast
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enthusiast
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Alexander Pope, ribbing some of the literary dunces of his era:
Pensive poets painful vigils keep,
Sleepless themselves to give their readers sleep.
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#80164
09/11/2002 2:25 PM
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Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 1,346
veteran
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veteran
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 1,346 |
Alexander PopeAh, that takes me back Thanks for the reminder of how very good Pope can be, slithy.
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#80165
09/11/2002 8:26 PM
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Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Love the Pope quote!
From where does the dunce's cap come from, by the way?
WW
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#80166
09/11/2002 8:57 PM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Dickens gets credit for written usage:
dunce's cap, a cap of conical shape, sometimes marked with a capital D, and placed on the head of a dunce at school. 1840 Dickens Old C. Shop xxiv, And on a small shelf, the dunce's cap.
but the foolscap, from which comes the shape, is much earlier.
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#80167
09/11/2002 9:02 PM
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Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Well, I'm confused. If the citation shows Dickens' use (1840), that doesn't necessarily mean that Dickens was the first to use the term (i.e., dunce's cap), does it?
Book regards,
DubDunce
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#80168
09/11/2002 9:05 PM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542
Carpal Tunnel
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alls it means is that it's the first written usage that Dr. Murray and co. found.
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