Carrol Cox:
> ...
> I haven't followed this thread very closely, since I place the
> Singers and his ilk ......
Gordon
>However, that sort of dismissal leaves the ilk's arguments to
>make their way untouched while it appeals to power -- which
>would have long since crushed the ilk if it could have, or at
>least their rhetoric.
And these are just the two latest. I've bit my tongue on this one for a while, but as a founder member of the "Society for the Preservation of the Word 'Ilk'" (SWP'I'), I have to speak out now.
"Ilk" is not a posh way of saying "Sort" or "Bunch" or "Kind". It's an Old Scots word meaning "same". So Laird Moncrieff of that Ilk is Moncrieff of that same, ie (the) Moncrieff of Moncrieff, the chieftain of the clan. It used to be a common way of referring to clan chiefs, but is now archaic and only the Moncreiffs style themselves that way. It is possible to use the word "ilk" correctly when the context is not the Moncrieff family (the construction "of an ilk with" is wrong but bearable; the SPW'I' had a contest for the best correct use which I never won). But it is difficult, and in general, a Saxon word is best.
Sorry about that. Do feel free to tell me where to go, as ever.
dd
>I guess that's my 3 for the day -- and it's only 12:20!
You're quite mistaken -- it's seven o'clock in the evening! :-)
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