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 #2 (permalink) Fri Sep 22, 2006 16:22 pm Warred, warring, wars |
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Hi Tamara
I'd say you'll basically only see the verb war in the present participle form (warring). I can't remember ever having heard it used any other way.
The expression "Wolf never wars against wolf." is new for me, too. ;)
Where are you getting these expressions from?
Amy
EDIT:
I found it entertaining (in the dictionary link) that the word war and the German word "Wurst" (sausage) have a common root. :lol:
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Yankee
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| #3 (permalink) Fri Sep 22, 2006 18:01 pm Warred, warring, wars |
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Thank you, Amy.
By the way, Google seems to be a bit more tolerant to warred than to warring. (Not in terms of numbers-of-use, but... in the general reaction itself :) )
Whereas BNC is rather indifferent - both ('warred' and 'warring') are acceptable.
OK.
But to me it (actual use of the verb, I mean) is quite surprising.
| Yankee wrote: |
| Where are you getting these expressions from? |
They are parts of explanations of some English proverbs for Russians by giving some equivalent sayings or idioms.
In this case ('Wolf ...') - for 'There is honour among thieves' and for 'Hawk will not pick out hawk's eyes.'.
P.S. By the way, ultimately I've found a reference to that 'The mouse lordships where a cat is not'.
15th century. :)
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Tamara
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| #4 (permalink) Fri Sep 22, 2006 18:44 pm Warred, warring, wars |
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| Tamara wrote: |
| By the way, Google is a bit more tolerant to warred than to warring. (Not in terms of numbers-of-use, but... in general reaction itself :) ) |
I've looked at the Google results. I get a couple of references to the "Waring Company" on the first page, but other than that, it looks like most of the 5 million results are for warring. :shock:
| Tamara wrote: |
| Whereas BNC is rather indifferent - both ('warred' and 'warring') are acceptable. |
For "warred", the BNC results all look literary and there were only 14 results. (Actually, I'm surprised there were even that many. :lol:)
"Warring" had 194 results and the usages all look much more "normal" to me (i.e., not like some romance novelist looking for words to use that no normal person ever uses. :lol:)
| Tamara wrote: |
| 'There is honour among thieves' |
Now, there's one I've heard. (But when I hear it, there's a "u" missing...;))
| Tamara wrote: |
| and for 'Hawk will not pick out hawk's eyes.' |
That's very similar to something I've heard in German.
| Tamara wrote: |
P.S. By the way, ultimately I've found a reference to that 'The mouse lordships where a cat is not'.
15th century. :) |
Ahhh... That explains why I hadn't heard it? But it certainly seems to be quite true. I know my cats are excellent "mouse police". :D
Amy
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Yankee
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| #5 (permalink) Fri Sep 22, 2006 22:58 pm Mouse policy :) |
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| Yankee wrote: |
| But it certainly seems to be quite true. I know my cats are excellent "mouse police". |
peace, not war :) ;)
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Tamara
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| #6 (permalink) Wed Sep 27, 2006 7:58 am Warly |
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Again...
By any chance I've met warly - one more word from this stange family...
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| Meaning of Villainous dictum | Idiom: 'happy go lucky' |
