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Does the spelling ''gaol'' for ''jail'' look antique to you. It does to me. It's
used by older people in my area. I'm from South Wales.
Do any of you use it? I don't.
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En <gaol> [dZeIl] and En <jail> [dZeIl] are from :
1/ ME <jaiole>/<jaile> from OF <jaole>/<jeole>
2/ ME <gayhole>/<gayhol>/<gayole>/<gaille>/<gaile>/<gaill> from Old Picard-Normand
<gaiole>/<gaole>/<gayole>.
All above-mentioned Romantic etymons are from Protofrench <gaviola> deriving from
Late Latin <caveola> = En <(little) cage> itself from Classical Latin <cavea> = En
<cage>.
See Fr <geôle> [ZOl].
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Many people in Australia still spell it as gaol and not jail. I'm young and many
people my age prefer to spell it as jail, but I still remember that in primary school
we were taught to spell it gaol. I used be confused when I'd read American novels
and come across the word jail rather than gaol.
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That's the complete opposite of here in the US, where <jail> is used universally,
and <gaol> is practically never encountered except in printed media from outside
the US. I myself remember getting confused when reading things printed in the UK
and seeing the spelling <gaol>, and while I figured out by context what such meant,
I'd always wonder how that was actually supposed to be pronounced.
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That should be "confused as a little kid when reading things printed in the UK" above.
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Yes, gaol is the official way of spelling it here.
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That's obviously not the real Kirk above.
Remember the scene in Star Trek VI with the two Kirks? It's sorta like that. ;-)
In answer to Don's question, the spelling "gaol" would look antique to me if it were
in an American text, because it would have to have been written no later than the
early 1900s. It wouldn't strike me as odd in a Commonwealth text though, because
I'm aware that it's used in British English.
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<<That's obviously not the real Kirk above.>>
That refers to a spam post under the name "Kirk" which got deleted.
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''In answer to Don's question, the spelling "gaol" would look antique to me if it
were in an American text''
Lazar,
Where I'm from the spelling ''gaol'' is used only by older people. I use the spelling
''jail''. I like ''jail'' better because it's phonetic, unlike ''gaol''.
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Sorry, That's me. I accidentally typed Kirk's name in.
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"Gaol" is simply the British English way of saying the American English "jail."
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The two forms of the word are due to the parallel dual forms in Old Central and Norman
French respectively, jaiole or jaole, and gaiole or gcsyolle. The Americans use
the first one, the British use the second one.
The common origin is from the Latin "gabiola", a diminutive formed from cavea, a
hollow, a den, from which the English cave is derived.
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See Fr <geôle> [ZOl].
Or more precisely : SFr [ZOl] or [ZOl@] vs NFr [Zol(@)] (plus other variants).
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