The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #172874 Message #4197881
Posted By: Lighter
24-Feb-24 - 03:06 PM
Thread Name: BS: Language Pet Peeves part II
Subject: RE: BS: Language Pet Peeves part II
Hard to believe, but here are two English words that are essentially as thoroughly synonymous as "gorse" and furze."
Not very exciting though:
"inalienable"
"unalienable."
Semantically identical and orthographically nearly so - just one letter different out of eleven.
The only other difference, if it is a difference, is that the Declaration of Independence uses "unalienable," though most people (who'd be unlikely to use either one in a sentence) think it's "inalienable."
Oxford shows "inalienable" from 1647 and "unalienable" from 1611.