They were talking about the aircraft carrier USS Intrepid on the radio and they mentioned the forecastle, but I have always wondered why it is pronounced "focksul" and not "for castle".
2006-10-01 14:39:33 · 11 answers · asked by 2007_Shelby_GT500 7 in Education & Reference ➔ Words & Wordplay
for a similar reason, as mention, that boatswain got shortened to bo'sun......forecastle is commonly written f'oc'sl' and pronounced as you wrote....
it comes from the design of ships up to about 1580; the decks forward and aft were built up to give a place for sailors to shoot small arms ( even arrows) at the other side....the forward castle and the aft castle....as ships ..especially English.....started emphasizing seaworthiness and sailing qualities those large structures had to go...and as ships....especially English.started emphasizing cannons rather than small arms there was no need for big ungainly and relatively flimsy structures
2006-10-02 04:13:13 · answer #1 · answered by yankee_sailor 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Like boatswain to bo'sun, originally the the pronunciation probably was boatswain and forecastle and over the years lazy tongues have simply altered the words in the English language to the words currently used.
2006-10-01 16:36:17 · answer #2 · answered by renclrk 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Chiroptera Pronunciation
2016-12-29 19:02:11 · answer #3 · answered by kersten 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Boatswain Pronunciation
2016-11-07 10:38:51 · answer #4 · answered by ? 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Ah! The fo'c'sle...you know, I never knew until you asked that it actually was a shortening of 'forecastle'. I thought it was just a crazy word with random apostrophes.
2006-10-01 18:42:41 · answer #5 · answered by soymilk 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
The term is Old English, and that's been the proper pronunciation since there begain to be such structures on oceangoing vessels.
2006-10-01 14:50:45 · answer #6 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
Perhaps the same people who pronounced boatswain "bo'sun" started this trend.
2006-10-01 14:41:38 · answer #7 · answered by Jeannie 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
It is a method to exclude those who are unfamiliar with the terms other than in books.
2006-10-01 14:42:32 · answer #8 · answered by finaldx 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Why is "comfortable" pronounced "comfterble"? Why is "familiar" often pronounced "furmiliar"? Why is "Worcestershire" pronounced "Wursturshur"?
2006-10-01 14:41:04 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Well, it seems that nobody knows so far, here. :-)
2006-10-01 20:10:55 · answer #10 · answered by The Mask 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋