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Fwd: Re: Tessellated or Tesselated? Misprints?
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I seem to have missed Sandy's original comment, but I think the
single 'l' was a very natural mistake on Nabokov's part: the
correct spelling looks odd. The reason the second 'l' is there
has not so much to do with the derivation from the participle --
in fact I question whether it is a participle -- but with the
way the word was formed in Latin. The first 'l' is actually the
'r' in the root word tessera (itself a Greek loan-word). To form
the diminutive, '-ula' would be added, giving 'tesserula.' The
unstressed interconsonantal 'u' drops out and the 'r' is
assimilated to an 'l.' The adjective tessellatus (used already
by Suetonius) in my view was formed from that, because as far as
I know there is no classical Latin verb related to 'tessera';
there may well have been a Late Latin one, but I suspect it was
a back-formation from the adjective.
At any rate, in order to spell "tessellated" correctly without
consulting a dictionary, one would have to have a pretty good
grasp of its etymology and the rules governing word formation
and consonantal shifts in Latin. And for an inveterate
dictionary-consulter Nabokov was not always a perfect speller --
in Pale Fire both 'triptych' and 'chthonic'-- two words that are
hard to spell correctly without keeping the Greek roots in mind
-- are misspelled (see discussion at
http://listserv.ucsb.edu/lsv-cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0104&L=nabokv-l&P=R638).
Whether any of these errors were picked up by Nabokov's
publishers' copyeditors, and if so whether he ignored the
corrections, is another matter. One would think that even his
very limited definition of an editor as a mere proofreader
(Strong Opinions 95) would cover things like this, but maybe not.
Mary
> Jansy Berndt de Souza Mello wrote:
>
> Sandy Drescher observed that the word "Tessellated", from the "etymologic note
> in Webster's On-line explains the unexpected-to-both-of-us double l's:
Etymology: Late Latin tessellatus, past participle of tessellare to pave with
tesserae, from Latin tessella, diminutive of tessera - :to form into or adorn
with mosaic".
>
> I checked the spelling in the Michaelis and OCE and confirmed Sandy´s find.
The is, indeed a missing "L" ( a distaster?) in my copies of "Ada" ( Penguin,
Vintage, Library of America ) The missing L appears even in "Adaonline" and in
Brian Boyd´s annotations.
>
>
I cannot imagine that the "missing L" resulted from faulty
revision, the mistake is too regular in the
various copies and editions of ADA.
>
> Was it omitted on purpose?
>
> Jansy
----- End forwarded message -----
single 'l' was a very natural mistake on Nabokov's part: the
correct spelling looks odd. The reason the second 'l' is there
has not so much to do with the derivation from the participle --
in fact I question whether it is a participle -- but with the
way the word was formed in Latin. The first 'l' is actually the
'r' in the root word tessera (itself a Greek loan-word). To form
the diminutive, '-ula' would be added, giving 'tesserula.' The
unstressed interconsonantal 'u' drops out and the 'r' is
assimilated to an 'l.' The adjective tessellatus (used already
by Suetonius) in my view was formed from that, because as far as
I know there is no classical Latin verb related to 'tessera';
there may well have been a Late Latin one, but I suspect it was
a back-formation from the adjective.
At any rate, in order to spell "tessellated" correctly without
consulting a dictionary, one would have to have a pretty good
grasp of its etymology and the rules governing word formation
and consonantal shifts in Latin. And for an inveterate
dictionary-consulter Nabokov was not always a perfect speller --
in Pale Fire both 'triptych' and 'chthonic'-- two words that are
hard to spell correctly without keeping the Greek roots in mind
-- are misspelled (see discussion at
http://listserv.ucsb.edu/lsv-cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0104&L=nabokv-l&P=R638).
Whether any of these errors were picked up by Nabokov's
publishers' copyeditors, and if so whether he ignored the
corrections, is another matter. One would think that even his
very limited definition of an editor as a mere proofreader
(Strong Opinions 95) would cover things like this, but maybe not.
Mary
> Jansy Berndt de Souza Mello wrote:
>
> Sandy Drescher observed that the word "Tessellated", from the "etymologic note
> in Webster's On-line explains the unexpected-to-both-of-us double l's:
Etymology: Late Latin tessellatus, past participle of tessellare to pave with
tesserae, from Latin tessella, diminutive of tessera - :to form into or adorn
with mosaic".
>
> I checked the spelling in the Michaelis and OCE and confirmed Sandy´s find.
The is, indeed a missing "L" ( a distaster?) in my copies of "Ada" ( Penguin,
Vintage, Library of America ) The missing L appears even in "Adaonline" and in
Brian Boyd´s annotations.
>
>
I cannot imagine that the "missing L" resulted from faulty
revision, the mistake is too regular in the
various copies and editions of ADA.
>
> Was it omitted on purpose?
>
> Jansy
----- End forwarded message -----