September 10, 2014 Wednesday "yogh" "yoni" "yoyo"

Reading the Merriam Webster Dictionary Backwards

September 10, 2014  Wednesday

blog address: Readingthedictionarybackwards.blogspot.com

email: ishmaelish36@blogspot.com

You can find my other blog of pediatric anecdotes, poetry, artwork and literature at ishmaelish36.blogspot.com

This brings to an end the "Y's" - all 5 pages of them.

Here is a wild one for today:

yogh:  \pronounced like 'yoke'\  [from Middle English: yogh, 3ogh]

a consonant in Middle English represented by the number 3, which is a palatal fricative  (a consonant created by a narrowing of a passage of the palate)

As far as I can tell, it represents the sound "y" (as in "eye") or the sound "g" (as in "night" which used to have the 'g' sound pronounced, as in 'neye gt.'   That solves the mystery of the spelling of the word "night" or "ni3t."

yoni:  [Sanskrit: vulva]  a Hindu religious symbol of the female genitalia

Now this one surprised me.  I wonder if Freud, with his discourse on the pervasive phallic symbol, was aware of this opposite theme, found in a totally different culture.  To me it makes sense…the beauty of the feminine, the female property of generation and the nourishment of life…fecundity.  

yo-yo:  I only mention this word because it is the only word I have found whose etymology is derived from the Philipines.

So, here's an index of the Y words:

Y:
  -y (suffix)
Yahoo
Yahweh
  Yahwism
Yahwistic
yalmulke
year
Yiddish
Yiddishist
yogh
yoni
yoyo