987: elipse and eclipse Aug 22, 2017

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Yesterday, there was an eclipse that was visible in the continental United States, leaving out those from every other country. Fittingly perhaps, the word comes from the Greek 'ekleipsis' and ultimately 'ekleipein' meaning ‘fail to appear', but more literally 'leave out' ('ek' means 'out' and 'leipein means 'to leave'). English also gets words related to this, 'ellipsis' and 'ellipse'. Both of these ultimately come from 'elleipein' meaning 'leave out', except here the K /k/ is not present. In this case, the Greek prefix was 'en-' usually meant 'in' not 'ek-'. This might lead you to believe that the meaning would have been 'leave in', but the prefix 'en-' or sometimes 'in-' depending on from where it is borrowed can be used to indicate several things, including that something is "made to be", such as with the word 'endear', but also the prefix can become an intensifier. Therefore, even though the prefix is sometimes modified when it precedes certain sounds and so it is no longer present as 'en-' in 'ellipsis', it does not mean "to leave in" but indeed "to leave out".

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