from the Latin “ dignus,” meaning worthy. Compare indignant, dignitary, condign, indignity.
troupe. An example of two words, with slightly different meanings, coming from one and the same French word. The French word is “ troupe,” meaning a company. This form is used in English for a company of players or actors. But the form “ troop ” is used chiefly of soldiers.
automatically. This is a modern English word from the Greek “ autos,” meaning self. Compare autobiography, autonomy, autocracy. Modern English is drawing largely from the Greek language for its new words.
alliteration. The Latin word for letter is “ littera.” From this we get many English words, e.g. letter, literate, literal, literature, illiterate, obliterate, transliterate, etc.
mirage. From the Latin “ mirari,” to wonder. Compare mirror, miracle, admire. This is one of the words in English which keeps the old French accent on the last syllable — miráge. The tendency in English is always to throw the accent back as far as possible. Many words have changed their pronunciation in the course of time. Obdurate, in Milton’s time, was pronounced obdúrate, but to-day it is pronounced óbdurate. Trafalgar was pronounced Trafalgár last century. Now we pronounce it Trafálgar.
