Quote:
Originally Posted by Cloud
I rather like the idiosyncrasies of English spelling; they inform and honor our language's complex history.
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Not if the spelling of the word tells lies about its origins.
DEBT: This word came into the English language from Norman French, where it was spelt "dette" with not a B anywhere in it. Later on, the hypercorrectionists got a hold of this innocent word, and forced into it a silent b, on the false belief that the word was borrowed directly from the Latin, not French. Although the word does ultimately come from the Latin, it does so by way of French, and thus the spelling should reflect the French origins of the word and not the Latin.
ISLAND: Another word that was mangled by the hypercorrectionists based on a false etymology. In this case, they mangled the word on the false belief that it was related to the Latin word "insula". The word island is actually a Germanic word of long pedigree, with cognates spelt "Eiland" in Dutch and German.
PTARMIGAN: This word is not from Greek roots, and thus has no business whatever having a silent P in front of it. It is of Gaelic derivation where the original word was spelt as "tarmachan". This word has no p at the beginning.
There are other words of this kind that tell lies about their origins. Anyone who advocates the etymological spellings of these and other such words must be made aware that false etymologies do exist.