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4. RHETORIC AND THE WORLD OF SCIENCE IN THE EModE PERIOD<br />

named this vertue discretion. And nowe some men do as moche abuse<br />

the worde modestie/ as the other dyd discretion. For if a man haue sadde<br />

countenance at al times/ & yet not beinge meued with wrathe/ but<br />

pacient / & of moche gentilnesse: they/ which wold be sene to be<br />

lerned/ wil say that the man is of a great modestie. where they shulde<br />

rather saye/ that he were of a great mansuetude: whiche terme beinge<br />

semblably before this time vnknowen in our tonge/ may be by the<br />

sufferaunce of wise men nowe receiued by custome: wherby the terme<br />

shall be made familiare.<br />

Especially from the 17 th century onwards, writers also compiled glossaries and<br />

dictionaries of hard words where readers could check the exact meaning of these obscure<br />

terms (Gotti 2006: 677-679), assuring readers that the strangeness of borrowings would<br />

be overcome by the use and familiarity with these new terms. Apart from their obscurity,<br />

many authors rejected borrowings because they were seen as rhetorical artifacts used to<br />

show the vanity of the writer and to achieve eloquence (Jones 1953: 96). As a result,<br />

inkhorn terms were heavily condemned because at that time a plain style was advocated<br />

by many in order to be understood by all audiences.<br />

Authors who disliked borrowing tried to enrich the English vocabulary by using<br />

the resources of the English language. Some writers restored archaisms into the<br />

vernacular, not to increase the vocabulary, but to benefit from their poetic force. This was<br />

the so-called “revival movement” (Jones 1953: 119). Other authors tried to find terms<br />

analogical to the foreign ones; to do so, some writers tried to render the technical terms<br />

into English using strategies such as compounding and affixation, or by giving a new<br />

sense to an already existing word. For instance, mooned was proposed instead of lunatic<br />

and fleshstrings instead of muscles (Jones 1953: 121-123).<br />

113

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