How ‘Smoke’ Misted English

December 5, 1952. The sky fell in London this morning. The guards can’tElizabeth II (“Queen’s Guards”) to distinguish the palace they guard. It is not easy for people to distinguish the sidewalk in front of them. Weather is dry, fog is dense. The British capital will spend five days in darkness. More precisely, what the British would later call “the big smoke.”

referred to byOnline Etymological Dictionary, the word “smoke” was born in 1905 from the mouth of the English treasurer of the Coal Smoke Abatement Society (Society for the Fight Against Coal Smoke), Henry Antoine des Voux. On August 26, noting his comments, the Journal of the American Medical Association wrote: “At a recent health conference in London, a member used a new term for the common condition in London. […] It’s not a pretty word, but it fits well with what it represents.”

The word “portmanteau”

“Smoke” is a portmanteau of the words “smoke” (“smoke”, from Proto-Germanic “smuck”) and “fog” (“thick and obscure fog”, Danish “fog”). This is what the British have called a “portmanteau word” since 1872. “Word-suitcase” in French. It is Lewis Carroll By the time his poem was published, we were obliged to coin the word Jabberwocky. This text contains many words whose abstract form makes it possible to combine two meanings in a single unit. And it’s very French “portmento” (a portmanteau word that dates back to the 16th century), Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland Then choose to qualify for this process.

Read moreElizabeth II: This language belongs to her alone

Again 1952. The veil was not lifted over London until December 10th. A yellow veil, with a sour taste. As the historian explained Catherine Turanco, the event was caused by a high concentration of smoke coming out of the chimneys, which was blocked by an anticyclone. The British had known about “the smoke” since the 19th century, but the episode caused the deaths of more than 10,000 people. So they coined another new word: “smash,” a portmanteau of “smoke” and “haze” (“opacity of the atmosphere”).