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Word of the Day > Word of the Day: Junctural Metanalysis

From the Phrases.org definition for humble pie:

In the 14th century, the numbles (or noumbles, nomblys, noubles) was the name given to the heart, liver, entrails etc. of animals, especially of deer - what we now call offal or lights. By the 15th century this had migrated to umbles, although the words co-existed for some time. There are many references to both words in Old English and Middle English texts from 1330 onward. Umbles were used as an ingredient in pies, although the first record of 'umble pie' in print is as late as the 17th century.

It is possible that it was the pies that caused the move from numbles to umbles. 'A numble pie' could easily have become an umble pie', in the same way that 'a napron' became 'an apron' and 'an ewt' became 'a newt'. This changing of the boundaries between words is called metanalysis and is commonplace in English.

Wikipedia makes a more careful distinction between metanalysis ("the act of breaking down a word or phrase into segments or meanings not original to it") and junctural metanalysis:

Junctural metanalysis is the process by which new words are formed from confusion over the boundaries of words. It is sometimes referred to as "false splitting," "juncture loss," and is a form of back formation.

The most cited examples of junctural metanalysis involve of words which are preceded by the indefinite article ("a" or "an"): some words that began with an initial vowel gained an "n" as speakers came to associate the "n" from the indefinite article ("an") with the word itself. Examples include:

• newt: "an ewt" became "a newt." Ultimately, the word can be traced back to Old English efete (sometimes spelled "eft").
• nickname: from "an eke name" ("eke" meaning "little" or "extra").

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