To mark 25 years since the signing of the #GoodFridayAgreement on 10 April, we've curated a special collection of articles from our journal #ParliamentaryAffairs (pub. Oxford Journals & ed. Alistair Clark/Louise Thompson).

Free for a limited time 👉 ow.ly/OCUB50NCq78.

I have only just discovered that the original meaning of 'prime time', in the 16th century, was Spring.

Interesting project!

The word ANY derives from ‘an’, the Old English word for one. The ‘–y’ ending is a suffix essentially meaning ‘having the qualities of’, and is the same as in words like ICY, DUSTY, and MESSY. So ‘any’ literally means ‘oney’—an unspecified something having the qualities of one.

Just as the adjective 'long' corresponds to the noun 'length', the adjective 'foul' corresponds to its own noun, which similarly ends in -th and has a different vowel - 'filth'.

Brilliant thread⬇️⬇️

That's beautiful.

A well-known feature of Italian is its double consonants.

Many of them come from pairs of different consonants in Latin - for example, Latin septem and octō became Italian sette and otto.

This is how Latin dictus (meaning 'said, mentioned') led, via Italian, to English 'ditto'.

Unlike 'ditto', the original Latin consonant cluster -ct- is still present in related words like 'dictionary', 'addiction' and 'prediction'.

“I gobble you enormously” ❤️

Although the number of clauses that can be embedded inside one another in a sentence is theoretically unlimited, our brains tend to struggle with three or more. So despite being grammatically sound, this is difficult to compute:

THE RAT THE CAT THE DOG CHASED KILLED ATE THE MALT

The word SCINTILLATE comes from a Latin word for a spark, SCINTILLA—which is also used in English for a tiny piece of something. A jumbled form of the same root, ‘stincilla’, is also the origin of the word STENCIL—which initially meant to decorate with sparkling metal or colour.

The noun ACHE was originally pronounced with a ”ch” sound, while only the verb was pronounced with a “k” sound—the same distinction that still divides pairs like SPEECH and SPEAK, and BATCH and BAKE. It wasn’t until the 1700s that both the noun and verb came to be pronounced “k”.

This has arrived. No. 57 in Kirsty Matheson Art’s #100daysofmusicasart Schoenberg’s Verklärte Nacht. Isn’t it fabulous? Thank you, Kirsty 😍

Two more books to add to the TBR list

Excellent to hear a matinal 'She moved through the Fair' arranged by Michael Alcorn (Michael Alcorn) on BBC Radio 3 Petroc Trelawny with two players from Downshire Brass, Lauren Stewart on flugelhorn and Gary Dodsworth on baritone horn (1'56') bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0…

Essential reading

Insights. Lots of good ones on this thread

FEETINGS are animal tracks or footprints left in snow.

Should students have their work professionally edited? Retired academic editor William Magette discusses the practical and ethical challenges facing freelance editors in ‘Editing Student Works’. New on AFEPI Ireland website blog: afepi-Ireland.com/blog/editing-s…