English has a numeral of prefixes that come from the conception of “ half . ” Why do we have so many ? And what ’s the divergence between them ?
1. SEMI
Semi- , from the Latin for “ half , ” is the most unwashed and the earliest to show up in English . It was first used , with the straight sense of “ half , ” in the wordsemicircular , but soon attached to concepts that were harder to quantify . It ’s easy to see what a half traffic circle search like , but what amount of “ abstract ” is “ semi - abstract ” ? How lasting is “ semi - lasting ” ? Through these less concrete uses , which proliferated wildly in the 1800s , semi - number to mean “ almost ” or “ somewhat . ”
2. HEMI
Hemi - is from the Greek for “ half . ” It is less common thansemi- , and it is associated more strongly with expert speech communication in fields like chemical science , biology , and anatomy . Its gumption of “ half , ” more thansemi-,implies a lengthwise axis vertebra of symmetricalness . This is not obvious for the most commonhemi - Scripture , hemisphere(since a sphere is symmetrical all the way around ) , but ahemicylinder , is not just half a piston chamber , it ’s the half ignore lengthwise , andhemiplegicdoesn’t just think half the torso is paralyzed , but the right or left one-half ( paraplegicis the condition for when only the lower one-half is paralyzed ) .
3. DEMI
Demi is from the French for “ half . ” It was first used in English in heraldry , where things wish demi - holy person , demi - social lion , demi - horses show up . It also hold careen in other specific land , such as military ( demi - brigade ) and fashion ( demi - cap , demi - lustre , demi - worsted ) . It also picked up the sense of “ virtual ” or even “ less . ” A superman , after all , is not quite the real matter .
It might seem ludicrous that English had to borrow a “ half ” prefix from three different places , but if it did n’t we would n’t get to have a Word of God likehemidemisemiquaver — that ’s a 64th government note , in other words , a one-half of a one-half of a one-half of an eighth note , which is so much less merriment to say thanhemidemisemiquaver .
