Sunday 9 July 2017

Compound Nouns

No, these are not nouns that are always playing in the compound! Take commonly used words like cupboard, bedroom, doughnut and shopkeeper. These words started off as two separate words. For example, prior to the 14 century, cups were kept on a sideboard and used as and when needed. Over time, these two words were fused to form the word cupboard which means 'a closed cabinet for the storage of food! 

Likewise, the bedroom was meant to be the room that contains the bed, ( bed + room) a room where one could sleep. It was also called the bedchamber previously, probably because of the Norman invasion which brought along French words like 'Chambre' which means room in French.

If you never knew, words also have a history of how they were formed and that is a subject called Etymology. An interesting link is www.etymonline.com, it is a free reference created by Mr Douglas Harper.  


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