This message is being posted in the hope that people will stop posting
messages about -gry. This subject has come up recently on the Stumpers
mailserv, and this reply was very informative.
This is a section of the document
'gopher_root:[searchidx]stumpers-l_1996-04.txt;30'.
Date: Tue, 23 Apr 1996 10:42:26 -0800 (PST)
From: John Riffe <jriffe@wln.com>
To: stumpers-l@CRF.CUIS.EDU
Cc: roberta_j_preve@ccmail.eo.ray.com, tkappus@minotpl.ndak.net
Subj: ! gry words
The following post is from the Stumper Archives. The Archives are
accessible via both Gopher and the World Wide Web. If you need help
accessing the Archives please email off the list and I will send you
complete directions. I hope this helps.
jriffe@wln.com Voice: (406) 657-8248
******************************************************************************
_GRY, WORDS THAT END IN
According to the _Oxford English Dictionary_, five words in the
English language end in "_gry_." In addition to the common _angry_ and
_hungry_:
_aggry_, a glass bead found buried in the earth in Ghana.
_puggry_, a light scarf wound around a hat or helmet to protect the
head from the sun, and
_meagry_, of meager appearance.
-- Ann Landers column, in response to question what word besides _angry_
and _hungry_ ends in "_gry_." _Daily Breeze_ (Torrance CA) 1/31/89; also
in Los Angeles _Times_ 1/31/89 p. V8.
William Safire in _What's the Good Word_ (1982) says the question is
a hoax, intended to waste the questionee's time. He quotes David
Guralnik, ed. of Simon & Schuster's _Webster's New World Dictionary_ as
saying there are no other "native English words" so ending, except
_angry_ and _hungry_. Guralnik notes three imported words:
_puggry_ -- an Indian turban; a scarf worn around a sun helmet.
_mawgry_ -- from Old French: being regarded with displeasure.
_aggry_ -- colored glass beads worn by Africans.
_RQ_, spring 1976, with 12 responses to a fall 1975 question, listed
_aggry_ ("describes a certain type of variegated glass bead found
buried in the earth in Ghana and in England"), citing _Webster's Third_
and _OED_.
_puggry_, a variant spelling of _puggree_ ("a light scarf wound around a
hat or helmet to protect the head from the sun"), citing _OED_,
_Webster's 2d_, and _Funk and Wagnall's Crossword Puzzle Word Finder_.
_gry_ itself (obsolete, "the grunt of a pig, the dirt under the nail;
hence the veriest trifle," further explained as "the smallest unit in
Locke's proposed decimal system of linear measurement, being the tenth of
a line, the hundredth of an inch, and the thousandth of a
['philosophical'] foot."), citing _OED_, also in Walker's _Rhyming
Dictionary of the English Language_ and Funk and Wagnall's_New Standard
Dictionary_.
An old (ca. 1974) ready-ref card at Lancaster <Library>, with no
overall attribution, listed:
_aggry_ -- Glass beads found in Africa. Word still in current use.
_Webster's New International_; _Oxford English Dictionary_.
_puggry_ -- Light turban or head-covering worn by Indian natives; scarf
veil wound around the crown of sun helmet. Word still in current use.
_Oxford English Dictionary_; _Webster's New World_.
_gry_ -- grunt of a pig; veriest trifle; measurement equal to one-tenth
line. Obsolete term. _Webster's Second_.
_anhungry_ -- alternate for ahungry. Obsolete term. _Webster's 3rd_.
_podagry_ -- gout in the feet; hence general term for gout. Obsolete
term. _Webster's 2nd_.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
More about -_gry_ ... if you care
Hungry. Aside from _angry_, the only other common English word that ends
in -_gry_. For reasons unclear, the commonest query that is addressed to
the editors at the G.C. Merriam Company goes like this: "There are three
English words that end in _-gry_. _Hungry_ and _angry_ are two of them,
what is the third?" Among the 450,000 entries in _Webster's Third New
International Dictionary_, there is only one other, which is _anhungry_,
an obsolete word for _hungry_ that is allowed to stay in the dictionary
because it shows up in Shakespeare. <_Coriolanus_. I:i:209.> Editors at
Merriam have found a few others buried deep within the _OED_, usually as
variant spellings. One is _puggry_, one of several spellings of _pugaree_
(also _pugree_, _puggree_, _puggaree_), which is a scarf wound around a
sun helmet.
-- Dickson, Paul. _Words_. New York: Delacorte Pr., 1982. p. 194-195.
===========================================================================
Opinion: I agree with William Safire, and people like him (language mavens)
and like us (wombats) continue to be codependent victims of this verbal
virus.
HTH,
Bill Thomas It's wombats all the gry down.
Lancaster Library
liblanc1@cerf.net
805/948-5039
__________________________________________________________________
Andrew Steinberg Internet: r1ahs@vm1.cc.uakron.edu
Public Services Librarian
University of Akron Law Library Phone: 330-972-5119
C. Blake McDowell Law Center
Akron, OH 44325-2902 Fax: 330-972-4948
__________________________________________________________________
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