Yep, I used this one recently. And, yes, I'm pretty sure I used it correctly. I'm even pretty sure I spelled it correctly. Does that mean I know what it really means?
Nope. Not a clue.
Here's my working definition: dastardly, low-handed, beyond the pale.
And here's what it really means:
Extremely wicked; evil and shocking. Flagitious. From the Old French heineaux, which relates to the modern French, haine, or hatred.
Uh-huh, uh-huh. So "hateable". Just what I thought, though I should have guessed that French connection... Wait a minute. Flagitious. Who the heck ever heard of that?
Well, apparently, I did. At least, I did read Edwin Abbott's Flatland at some point, so certainly came across this quote:
All faults or defects, from the slightest misconduct to the most flagitious crime, Pantocyclus attributed to some deviation from perfect Regularity in the bodily figure...
But I must have glided right over it, as is my wont.
Flagitious: Extremely wicked, deeply criminal, shockingly brutal or cruel.
And where does it come from, then? Why, from the Latin flagitare--to demand earnestly or hotly. In this, shall we say, heated aspect, it is related to "flagrant", a word I think we're all much more familiar with, which stems from flagrare , "to blaze, to burn".
Apparently, flagitium was an early Roman form of public humiliation, in which, in the most typical scenario, a debt-collector would gather a crowd around a person or their home and loudly shame them for not paying up.
Sounds a bit brutal itself.
"Flagitious" seems to have largely passed out of our daily speech, but one thing the word kept turning up in the course of my Googling was a girl grindcore band. From Japan.
If you're into that kind of thing, here's a good post about Flagitious Idiosyncracy in the Dilapidation. There's even a link to a download.
Call me naive, but somehow I don't think they researched the debt collecting practices of ancient Rome when it came time to thinking up their name.
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Would a flagitious deed subject the perpetrator to flagellation?
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of barbaric crimes and punishments, my v-word is conin
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Detectives Beyond Borders
"Because Murder Is More Fun Away From Home"
http://detectivesbeyondborders.blogspot.com/
This I do not know. I considered myself lucky to finally track down a link between flagitious and flagrant, which I thought might be the case, but I have been known to pursue a false link or two.
ReplyDeleteFlagellate is related to flagrum, according to the short etymology in my desk dictionary, but I won’t whip myself over it.
ReplyDeleteI fell in love with flagitious the first time I read it, which may have been in Flatland.
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Detectives Beyond Borders
"Because Murder Is More Fun Away From Home"
http://detectivesbeyondborders.blogspot.com/
TNot related then, I guess. Though conflagration would be.
ReplyDeleteConflagration and flagrant seem to be related. Now, let me just reach into my pocket for my full-size O.E.D. and look for more etymologies.
ReplyDelete==============
Detectives Beyond Borders
"Because Murder Is More Fun Away From Home"
http://detectivesbeyondborders.blogspot.com/
Yes, fire or at least burning seem to be the common element for all three.
ReplyDeleteSomeday the complete O.E.D. will be pocket-sized, I bet.
Nope, I want a full-size, old-fashioned multivolume version.
ReplyDelete==============
Detectives Beyond Borders
"Because Murder Is More Fun Away From Home"
http://detectivesbeyondborders.blogspot.com/
It's understandable, but the times will out.
ReplyDeleteHeinous crimes I had heard about, but flagitious was new and unknown (like it was to the Japanese girl group, I suspect).
ReplyDeleteWe used to learn this little rule for spelling, "i after e, except after c", and I always noted 'heinous' as an exception to this rule, so I remembered the spelling.
So far, the only person who 'flagitious' seems not to be new to is Peter. And I include the girl grindrock band.
ReplyDeleteThe funny thing about 'heinous' is that I'm pretty sure that in my mind it is sometimes pronounced 'he-in-us'. That would be because I have rarely spoken the word aloud, where ridicule would promptly have corrected me...
nice post...really u have come up with something different!!
ReplyDeleteThank you, Nazish! And I'm enjoying your metaphysical ponderings over on your blog as well.
ReplyDeleteHow can you not love a Japanese female grindcore group with a name like Flagitious Idiosyncracy in the Dilapidation? These things warm your heart.
ReplyDeleteI liked the fact that in Dickensian England people who couldnt pay their debts were thrown in prison until they could. Nice logic there.
ReplyDeleteMarco, all power to this Japanese girl band, but I have to admit that I didn't listen to them. Perhaps it was this description that scared me off:
ReplyDeleteVocalist Makiko uses two different vocal styles, one being a high pitched, shrill scream that is definitely intoxicating as well as a low pitched growl.
Adrian, yes, debtors' prison sounds a lot worse than having people standing outside your house screaming at you. Having lived by the Boardwalk for a couple of year, I imagine I could hold up to the screaming quite well. You could always pretend they were really calling for someone else.
But prison? I don't know.
I have been trying to get to the bottom of this 'copy' issue, but so far,no go. I mean, basically is just text, but when and why it became known as 'copy' I haven't discovered yet.
ReplyDeleteOops, wrong thread.
ReplyDelete