Uncle Garabed’s Notebook (June 20, 2015)

On Controversy

If a cause be good, the most violent attack by its enemies will not injure it so much as an injudicious defense of it by its friends.

… Walter Colton

Illustrious Chroniclers

Historians, it is said, fall into one of three categories:

Those who lie.

Those who are mistaken.

Those who do not know.

From the Word Lab

Jot and tittle, originally from the King James version of the Bible, at Matthew 5:18:

“For verily I say unto you, till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.”

A jot is the name of the least letter of an alphabet or the smallest part of a piece of writing. It is the Anglicized version of the Greek iota, the smallest letter of the Greek alphabet, which corresponds to the Roman “i.” Apart from its specialist typographical meaning, we still use the word jot more generally to mean “a tiny amount.” Hence, when we have a brief note to make, we “jot it down.”

A tittle, rather appropriately for a word that sounds like a combination of tiny and little, is smaller still. It refers to a small stroke or point in writing or printing. In classical Latin this applied to any accent over a letter, but is now most commonly used as the name for the dot over the letter “i.”

The phrase “jot and tittle” indicates that every small detail has received attention.

It is thought that the phrase “to a T” is derived from the word tittle because long before “to a T” became popular, the phrase “to a tittle” was used.

The phrase “to dot one’s Is and cross one’s Ts” is used literally and also to mean “to put the finishing touches to” or “to be thorough.”

What’s in a Name?

Hatsakordzian/Hatsatoukhian: Armenian in derivation, identified as a trade, hatsakordz and hatsatoukh are defined as baker, kordz meaning work, and toukh from tkhel meaning to bake (bread).

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CK Garabed

Weekly Columnist

C.K. Garabed (a.k.a. Charles Kasbarian) has been active in the Armenian Church and Armenian community organizations all his life. As a writer and editor, he has been a keen observer of, and outspoken commentator on, political and social matters affecting Armenian Americans. He has been a regular contributor to the Armenian Reporter and the AGBU Literary Quarterly, “ARARAT.” For the last 30 years, Garabed has been a regular contributor to the Armenian Weekly. He produces a weekly column called “Uncle Garabed's Notebook,” in which he presents an assortment of tales, anecdotes, poems, riddles, and trivia; for the past 10 years, each column has contained a deconstruction of an Armenian surname. He believes his greatest accomplishment in life, and his contribution to the Armenian nation, has been the espousing of Aghavni, and the begetting of Antranig and Lucine.

Latest posts by CK Garabed (see all)

• A Reminiscence: John Najarian - February 19, 2020
• Uncle Garabed’s Notebook (Aug. 5, 2017) - August 7, 2017
• Uncle Garabed’s Notebook (July 22, 2017) - July 22, 2017