cacophony

A cacophony is a big old noise, and an unpleasant one at that. Looking and sounding as chaotic as what it describes, ‘cacophony’ comes from the Greek kakophōnía. That’s a mash-up of kakos meaning ‘bad’, and phōnē which means ‘voice’ or ‘sound’. So it literally means ‘bad sound’. No sugar-coating here.

In classical rhetoric (the ancient art of persuasion through language), ‘cacophony’ referred specifically to harsh or clashing combinations of sounds in speech or writing – phrases that were awkward to say, unpleasant to hear or stylistically jarring. So if a sentence was hard to say out loud or just didn’t flow well, it might be criticised as ‘cacophonous’.

‘Cacophony’ first turned up in English in the mid-1600s, when people were busy developing new types of machinery and opera. So you can see why a word for noisy noises might be useful. Its first appearance in print was in Thomas Blout’s Glossographia, one of the earliest dictionaries (published in 1656 with the subtitle ‘A Dictionary Interpreting All Such Hard Words… As Are Now Used in Our Refined English Tongue’ which I love). There it was used to describe ‘an ill, harsh, or unpleasing sound’.

Despite its unpleasant meaning, ‘cacophony’ has a classy family tree, sharing a root with ‘symphony’ – that’s the same phōnē, but this time combined with sym-, meaning together. Its antonym (a fancy way of saying ‘opposite’) is the lesser-known ‘euphony’, which literally means ‘good sound’.

aspersion

Aspersions are critical or mean remarks about someone. They’re almost always ‘cast’, and usually a bit sneaky. But do you actually know what an aspersion is? Nope, me neither.

‘Aspersion’ actually has surprisingly saintly roots. It comes from the Latin ‘aspergere’, which means ‘to sprinkle’ or ‘to scatter’ (see also, ‘disperse’ and ‘intersperse’). In ye olde church services, priests would sprinkle holy water over the congregation – a ritual called, you’ve guessed it, an aspersion.

An AI-generated picture of people casting aspersions on each other

In print, one of the earliest known uses of ‘aspersion’ (in that blessing sense) appears in John Foxe’s 1570 translation of Actes and Monuments, a work of Protestant history and martyrology (sounds like a banger). The exact phrase is ‘the aspersion of the blood of Jesus Christ’. I’m pretty sure this isn’t literal (I hope so, at least – the dry cleaning bills would be a bitch).

You can also find this use of ‘aspersion’ in Shakespeare’s The Tempest:

‘No sweet aspersion shall the heavens let fall / To make this contract grow.’

So how did we get from a light dousing of holy water to someone suggesting you’re morally bankrupt? Well, by the late 16th century, the OED and other sources record the word shifting meaning. It picked up a figurative use as a ‘bespattering with slander, derogatory criticism’ in the 1590s, losing its literal connection to holy water. By 1749 it was firmly in the negative, as shown in this quote from Henry Fielding’s Tom Jones:

‘… for I defy all the world to cast a just aspersion on my character: nay, the most scandalous tongues have never dared censure my reputation.’

Are aspersions always plural? No, they can be singular – ‘an aspersion was made against me’, for example. But you’ll sound super weird if you say that (and deserve that aspersion).

‘Aspersion’ is a great example of how words evolve – from blessing people with holy water to lightly soiling their reputation. Sprinkle responsibly.