Know your English !! Part.IX

Mnemonic: Rhyme formula or device used as an aid to memory. For example, the colors of the rainbow can be recalled by the sentence Richard Of Yark Gave Battle in Vain. The initial letters of words in the sentence prompt the names of the colors in their correct order: Red, Orange, Yellow Green, Blue, Indigo, and Violet.

Pidgin: Simplified language based on two or more other tongues, and generally developed in colonial times as a means of communication between foreigners and indigenous people. Pidgin often sounds comical to speakers of one of the original languages- for example when an English speaker hears Prince Philip described as number one fellah bilong Missis Queen.

Pidgin English was originally a form of Anglo Chinese used by 17^th century traders; curiously the term ‘pidgin’ is believed to have been a Chinese corruption of the word ‘ business’.

Palindrome: Words are expression that reads the same backwards and forwards.

Example:  Otto, Reviver, and the sentences

                Evil rats on no star live and Able was I ere I saw Elba

Pyrrhic victory: Victory that involves such great losses for the victor as to be almost as bad as defeat. The phrase is based on a supposed remark by Pyrrhus, a Greek king of the 3^rd century BC. After defeating the Roman army in a battle, but suffering severe losses to his own army, he is believed to have said:’ We cannot afford another victory like that.’

Trans-: Prefix, from Latin, meaning ‘across’, ‘over’, ‘beyond’ or ‘through’, as in  translate, transplant, trans-Siberian, transcend and transparent