[IBC] Off Topic, The Origin of Puns
 

As some of you have noticed, I have a Punomatic in my back
pocket, which fires
off puns at the slightest provocation. See Genesis, 21: 27-31.
As far as I
know, that is the first pun in Western literature. For those
who don't know
Hebrew, the word for oath is the same as the word for seven,
sheva or sheba.
Now I am sure that when Abraham trotted out the seven sheep, he
was not trying
to be funny. To the ancient mind, words themselves had a
magical quality, and
he probably did this to cement the treaty & assure it some
additional good
luck. To this day, certain words or phrases in many cultures
take on a strength
of their own. I would like to know, at what point did the pun
stop being a
source of magic and become a form of humor?
Iris,

Two places that might know, Iris:

Alt.usage.English -- a cantankerous group of language freaks who
can milk out a pun longer than anyone.

The copyeditor's listserv -- you'll have to search. I used to
belong, but 250 messages a day were a bit much. They punny too,
but THEY know when to stop. ;-)

But language and its history are the reason for living for these
two groups. I'd visit A.U.E. more often, but I try to avoid the
"alt" newsgroups.

Jim Lewis - - Tallahassee, FL - Our life is
frittered away by detail . . . . Simplify! Simplify. -- Henry
David Thoreau - Walden

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