Variations on the word "worry"

[luzula]

1) I had meant to go to my parents today after a week of quarantining as best one can in an apartment with other people, but I feel a very slight tickle in my throat, which could be my imagination, but it makes me worried. Better wait a day and see. /o\

2) Occasionally I realize I've been using a word that is not allowable in 1750 and have to go back and edit it out of all my Flight of the Heron fic. Today's word is "worry" in the sense of "feeling anxious or troubled". Sigh, that word was a transitive verb meaning "to annoy or vex someone" back then (from an earlier stronger meaning of "to slay, kill or injure by biting and shaking the throat"), and I have now replaced it with variations of concern/trouble/fret/fear, which are all fine. I make copious use of the Online Etymology Dictionary. I mean, it's not that I imagine myself to actually be writing as they did in 1750, nor is that necessarily my goal, but at least I can try to avoid anachronisms.

And indeed, there is not a single use of "worry" in canon! Yeah, Broster did her research. But hey, she was born in 1877, and the intransitive use of "worry" to mean "feeling anxious or troubled" is actually only attested from 1860, though the use "to cause mental distress or trouble" is attested from 1822.

Another error I've recently discovered is that Anglicans/Episcopalians do not pray for the souls of the dead! This is/was a Catholic thing to do. Ugh, I have a character do this at least at one point, I suppose I should fix it. I should thank Naomi Mitchison for this discovery.

Comments

[starshipfox]

Yes, in the 19th century too, I believe: it's interesting to see the intense suspicion of Catholics in Victorian fiction. I didn't realise that the doctrine around prayer for the dead was so strong. I think the suspicion of Catholics as "death worshippers" may link to both the saints *and* the prayers for the dead. I'm not quite sure what the Anglican position on transubstantiation is, but I know some kinds of Protestants are made very uncomfortable by that too. As an Irish person who was brought up atheist but went to both Catholic and Protestant schools, I've picked up *a lot* of stuff, but it's not very sensibly organised in my brain.