Last week we discussed some of the words that change in meaning and pronunciation by the addition of the letter e, and that reminded us of other word pairs that differ only by one letter. Many of these words are frequently confused by English students, whether English is their first language or not. We recommend that you review this list, and keep an eye out for other words whose spellings are close, but whose meanings can be far apart.

table (TAY-buhl) / tablet (TAH-bleht)
Both of these words come from the Latin root tabula (“board, plank”) but followed slightly different etymological paths. Table can either mean a piece of furniture or an set of data arranged in rows and columns (though it’s not clear why we use the same word for both). Tablet usually refers to a small block used for writing, whether that’s a pad of paper or a piece of stone or wood that has been carved with letters.

vocation (voh-KAY-shun) / avocation (AH-voh-KAY-shun)
This pair of words provides an excellent example of how useful it is to look up a word’s etymology. At first glance, these appear to be the same word (and indeed, many people use them interchangeably, and incorrectly). Vocation comes from the Latin word vocare, (“to call”), and a vocation is a person’s “calling,” their job or occupation. But when you add the Latin prefix ab- (“away from”) it’s obvious that an avocation is not a job, it’s what you do when you’re away from your job, i.e. a hobby or pastime.

jam / jamb
These two words are both pronounced JAM but come from different root words. The origin of the word jam may come from the Old English champ, with the meaning “to step on, to crush.” From this we get the modern usage in a jam, which can be either actual (in a crowd of people or cars, perhaps) or metaphorical (stuck in a difficult situation). The word jamb comes from the Old French word jambe, meaning “leg,” and is usually paired with the word door. A door jamb is one of the two vertical pieces on either side of the opening.

cache (KASH) / cachet (ka-SHAY)
The French verb cacher, meaning “to hide,” gives us the English word cache, a place in which one hides or stores things. An archaic meaning of cacher was “to press” and this led to the two meanings of cachet in French, either “a small compressed tablet of medicine” or “a stamp or seal.” Because official communication from the king was authenticated by the royal seal, the word eventually came to refer to something that was approved or endorsed by royalty, and therefore valuable. It’s from this sense that we get the English definition of cachet as “value, prestige.”

But first I pray yow, of youre curteisye,
That ye narette it nat my vileynye,
Thogh that I pleynly speke in this mateere
To telle yow hir wordes and hir cheere
Ne thogh I speke hir wordes proprely.

Unless you’re a scholar of Middle English, you’ll probably have some difficulty understanding this paragraph from the Prologue of Geoffrey Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales” due to the many changes in English orthography (spelling) since the 14th century. One of the characteristics of Middle English that you’ll probably notice right away is the addition of a final e at the end of words, including the word word (or “worde” as Chaucer wrote). While we’ve dropped this final e in Modern English from word and cheer and tell and your, there are still instances in English where the presence or absence of a final e may give you problems. We’ve found several pairs of words that only differ by this one letter, listed below:

breath / breathe
A breath (BRETH) is the air you draw into your lungs, and when you’re doing that, you breathe (BREETH). Notice that the th sound in breath is the same as in the word death, while the th sound in breathe is same as in the words this and that.
Example: She’s holding her breath waiting for the results of the vote, but when she wins, she’ll breathe a sigh of relief.

envelop / envelope
The verb envelop (ehn-VEH-lup) means “to wrap around, to surround.” An envelope (AHN-veh-lohp) is the thing that wraps around something else.
Example: Anna enveloped John in her arms to comfort him when he received the envelope containing the news of his son’s death in the war.

born / borne
While these two words are pronounced the same way, the word born means “brought into existence” and the word borne means “supported or carried.”
Example: I don’t think I could have borne the loneliness in my life if you had never been born.

corps / corpse
Don’t get these two words confused! The noun corps (COR) refers to a group of people who perform the same function (a unit of soldiers in an army, for example, or the Corps of Engineers). A corpse (CORPS) is a dead body, and it’s not performing any functions any more.
Example: He joined the army and was part of the medical corps for seven years, but even with all of his experience he still became nauseated when he saw a fresh corpse.

Take a few minutes to study this list of words, including their definitions and pronunciations, and make sure that you can use them correctly with ease.

Translation: “But first I pray that by your courtesy you ascribe it not to my ill manners if I speak plainly in this matter, telling you their words and cheer, and if I speak their very words as they were.” For a bit of fun with Middle English, check out “Geoffrey Chaucer Hath A Blog.”

The Vocabulary Builder’s Blog focuses on the study of words, their origins, their definitions and use, and on ways that you can get the most out of your study program and develop a broad knowledge of English vocabulary and the skill to use that vocabulary effectively. We have years of experience in the field of vocabulary study, and know how to help you overcome any problem you might have with the English language, using all of the resources we’ve collected over the years.

While it’s useful to develop a solid base of knowledge and use that wealth of information to come up with perfect solutions to a problem, sometimes you need to find answers quickly to achieve an immediate goal. The word heuristics (from the Greek heuriskein, meaning “to find, to discover”) refers to a method of problem-solving that is more intuitive, based on common sense, practicality, and trial-and-error methods. You may have heard a saying similar to “don’t let good get in the way of good enough” – that’s heuristics in a nutshell. This problem-solving strategy is based on past experience (your own or others’) and is part of the unconscious decision-making that we do every day, when we take incomplete information and use it to make a judgment on what to do next. Scientists use heuristics in computer programming to speed up search functions and virus scans.

How you interpret the information you have, whether that’s based on a written text or on the actions of the people around you, is hermeneutics. This word comes from the Greek hermeneuein (“to interpret”) and originally referred to the study of religious texts such as the Bible; the word first appeared in the English language in the 17th century, though scriptural interpretation has been a part of both the Christian and Jewish tradition for thousands of years. In a more modern sense, hermeneutics refers to the general interpretation of meanings, and how people communicate and understand each other in the context of their social situation, history, and outlook.

We’ll continue to provide you with the information you need to make the best decisions about your vocabulary study practice, and provide you with the meanings and definitions of useful words.

Do you have questions about a word you’ve come across lately? Post your questions in the comments and we’ll help you find the answers you need.

There are excellent reasons for working hard to improve your English vocabulary: you’ll be able to easily and quickly read and understand a broader variety of books, documents, and papers; you’ll have more confidence speaking in front of groups, with clients and customers, or one-on-one with your supervisors at work; and your increased skills in writing and communication will help you further your career goals. With all of these benefits, we’d be surprised if anyone tried to impugn your motives in choosing to focus on vocabulary study.

To impugn means to call into question someone’s opinions or actions by accusing them of being wrong (in the case of an opinion) or of doing something for the wrong reasons (in the case of an action). The Latin word pugnare, meaning “to fight,” is at the root of this word, and its synonyms are equally combative in nature: to challenge and to dispute have the same meaning as to impugn.

Example: Alex thought that the congregation he joined was accepting of all viewpoints, but when he began to impugn the wisdom of the church leaders and their views on the role of women, he was quickly asked to leave and find another place to worship.

Other words that share the Latin root pugnare are pugnacious and repugnant. Someone who is pugnacious is quick to fight. The word repugnant literally translates as “to fight back” – in this case, if something is repugnant it’s not because it’s fighting back, it’s because the reaction it inspires in you is to reject it, to back away, or to fight it off.

Keep fighting hard for your right to an excellent English vocabulary! Remember, we’re on your side.

Yesterday we left you running at double speed with a high dose of caffeine from espresso – today we’ll slow things down with a set of four adjectives that aren’t moving very fast at all.

dilatory (DIH-luh-tor-ee)
From the Latin word dilatorius (“deferring”) this adjective describes either a procrastinator, someone who is deliberately delaying a process, or the method by which that procrastination or delay is achieved.
Example 1: The senator insisted on having the full text of each new bill read out loud before a vote could be called, and by this dilatory tactic managed to delay the passage of the budget bill until after the tax deadline had expired.
Example 2: “The whole party were in hopes of a letter from Mr. Bennet the next morning, but the post came in without bringing a single line from him. His family knew him to be, on all common occasions, a most negligent and dilatory correspondent; but at such a time they had hoped for exertion.” – Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

lethargic (luh-THAR-jik)
In Greek mythology, the river Lethe flowed through the underworld (Hades) and the newly-arrived dead would drink the water from the river to forget their past lives. The word lethargic can mean “indifferent, uncaring” and can also indicate someone or something that is slow and sluggish, unwilling or unable to move quickly. The noun form of this word is lethargy.
Example: Upon hearing that the factory was shutting down, the employees became depressed and lethargic and their productivity plummeted, sending the company into bankruptcy even more quickly.

stagnant (STAG-nuhnt)
The Latin word stagnatum (“standing [water]”) is the basis for this word, which still has the same general meaning today. Stagnant water can be found in pools and puddles that have no fresh water coming in. In a more general sense, something that is stagnant is showing little to no movement.
Example: In this stagnant economic climate, it can be hard to find investors who are willing to take a chance on a start-up company.

torpid (TOR-pihd)
The word torpid can be used as a synonym for lethargic, when talking about a person or an animal that is sitting still and unwilling to move, though otherwise conscious. However, it’s also used to describe a state of torpor, which is more like hibernation or a very deep sleep. Torpor has its roots in the Latin word for “numbness” and a creature that is torpid might not move if you poke it with a pin, though a merely lethargic one will show a reaction.
Example: “It is man’s own fault, it is from want of use, if his mind grows torpid in old age.” – Samuel Johnson

Keep your mind alert and growing with your English vocabulary study and by practicing these new words.

Paleontologists and geneticists have traced the human race all the way back to Africa; historians focus on the development of civilizations, and most agree that the Middle East is the origin of much of the richness in culture and knowledge that we enjoy today. The fertile valleys of Mesopotamia, between the Tigris and the Euphrates, were home to the first settled agricultural societies, ones that had more time to spend developing the arts, music, and language. Linguists are particularly interested in finding words and concepts that originated in these societies. Some of these words are part of today’s standard English vocabulary.

algebra
The ancient Babylonians developed a sophisticated mathematical system that was adopted by the Greeks and expanded on by Arabic scholars, who were the preeminent mathematicians in the thousand years leading up to the Renaissance. The word comes from the title of a treatise written in the 9th century titled Kitab al-Jabr wa-i-Muqabala (which translates roughly to “Book on Calculation by Completion”).

coffee, café
The Arabic word qahwa gave us our English word for the bitter stimulating drink, via the Italians; the word and the drink reached Europe in the late 16th century. By the 17th century, there were established cafés across the continent, providing places where one could drink coffee.

lemon
With the spread of the Islamic caliphate across the Mediterranean basin, Europeans were introduced to citrus fruit. The Arabic word limun refers to all citrus fruit in general, and our English word comes from the Italian limon. In French, limon means “lime” and “lemon” is citron, while in English a citron is not a lemon, but a larger fruit whose peel is often candied and added to fruitcake.

magazine
In the 13th century, this word (from the Arabic makhazin) meant storehouses in general, but later became specifically associated with storehouses of weapons or gunpowder. It’s possible that the first printed magazine was a listing of an army’s arsenal, but by the mid-18th century the term was applied to any written collection of various pieces of information.

If you’re interested in Arabic literature, you might enjoy the 12th-century poetry of Omar Khayyám; he was also a famous mathematician, and wrote a treatise on algebra. For a more modern perspective, we recommend the works of Naguib Mahfouz, whose novels describing life in Cairo brought him the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1988.

One of the new trends in parenting lately is getting children to eat more vegetables by disguising them in other foods kids love: adding pureed beetroot or spinach to a chocolate cake, mixing shredded zucchini into a beefburger or meatloaf, providing dips and spreads for fresh carrot and celery strips, or just covering everything with cheese. With especially picky eaters, such subterfuge may be necessary at every meal. A subterfuge (SUB-ter-fyuj) is a trick or strategy designed to fool someone in order to accomplish a goal. The word comes from the Latin roots subter (“under [cover]”) and fugere (“to flee”), and initially was used only to refer to military actions.

Example: After allowing the Austrian spy to escape carrying the false battle plans, the Prussian generals sent a small company to attack the western wall of the city, while bringing their main force behind the Austrian troops; this subterfuge led to their success in the Battle of Mollwitz.*

There are several other common English words that share the same Latin root fugere, including refuge (REH-fyuj), or a place to “flee back” to; centrifuge (SEN-trih-fyuj), which is used to make things “flee the center”; and fugitive (FYU-jih-tihv), someone who is fleeing or escaping.

What tricks and stratagems do you use to make difficult study sessions more enjoyable? Our equivalent of a verbal chocolate cake is poetry – the lines and phrases are so deliciously descriptive that it’s a pleasure learning how the new vocabulary words fit in them. There’s no escaping the need to practice and review in English vocabulary study, but you can reward yourself with a well-chosen work to read (or a piece of candy, if you prefer!).

* probably not historically accurate, but a good example of the word in context