www.alphadictionary.com

• rivet •

Pronunciation: ri-vit • Hear it!

Part of Speech: Noun, verb

Meaning: 1. (Noun) A short pin for holding together two sheets or other flat surfaces by beating out, bending, or spreading the end opposite the head. 2. (Verb) To join two sheets or plates with a rivet or rivets. 3. (Verb) To hold fast someone or completely lock their attention.



Notes: Rosie the Riveter was the star of a poster campaign to recruit women to the workforce during World War II. So, the verb rivet allows a personal noun. The adjective and action noun are, like indigenous English words, the present participle, riveting.

In Play: Rivets are not only used in erecting the steel skeletons of tall buildings: "The rivets in Shirley's blue jeans set off the alarm of the metal detector at the airport." In normal conversations the figurative sense of today's word is more often encountered: "The video clip of himself in the news riveted Barkley to the TV." Barkley found the story of his exploits riveting.

Word History: Today's Good Word was borrowed from French rivet "nail, rivet", a noun derived from river "to attach, clinch, cling". This word is akin to the English meaning of rive "split, smash, rip" because of the way you secure a rivet. This word was built on PIE rei- "to scratch, tear, cut", source also of Latin rima "rip", Swedish riva "to tear, scratch", German Riss "chink, crack" and ritzen "to to scratch, scarify", Norwegian ripa "to scratch", and English rip, ripple, and reap. Greek ereipein "to crash" seems also to share the same origin. (Many thanks to Barbara Beeton for recommending today's most riveting Good Word.)

I would much prefer being riveted over being gorgonized. Unless we're talking slasher film torture via rivets, then I'll go straight to stone, thank you very much.

I sat riveted to my seat as I read this entry. I know I have tried to use humor on the responses I have made today. So please, either laugh or groan but don't disparage.

No chance of disparagement Philip. Although I wince for the pain of being riveted to your seat. Glued is surely less uncomfortable?

Not if you forget and try to stand up...

Ouch!

From the Iliad, Book XX (Translated by Alexander Pope)
. . . Hippodamas . . . seized with fright
Deserts his chariot for a swifter flight:
The lance arrests him; an ignoble wound
The panting Trojan rivets to the ground.

Ouch indeed

And a side note: does anyone know how Pope pronounced "wound"?
For me (West Coast American dialect) it does not rhyme with "ground" or "sound" but does rhyme with "spooned" or "tuned."

And a side note: does anyone know how Pope pronounced "wound"?
For me (West Coast American dialect) it does not rhyme with "ground" or "sound" but does rhyme with "spooned" or "tuned."

If this, "The pronunciation /waʊnd/ is however given by some dictionaries of the 18th century (Kenrick, 1733; Jones, 1798), is widely current in dialects, is implied in various forms of wounds int. and zounds int., and was common in the adverb woundy adj.1", is to be trusted, then the pronunciation would possibly have been a rhyme.

That quote is from https://english.stackexchange.com/quest ... -and-wound, and is itself a quote from the OED.

Thank you, Slava. I suspected as much. As I while my way through the State of Emergency here in Japan by reading Pope's translation of the Iliad, I am finding a number of words that he rhymes in unexpected ways. I will post a few of them in the Pronunciation thread in a few days and ask if anyone has information on the pronunciation of early 18th century London dialects. Part of the fun in reading his translation (rhymed couplets) is finding hints of how English used to be spoken.

I guess that ancient pronunciation accounts for some of them, but probably poetic licence accounts for others.