When was spoonerism invented

After graduating, he returned to New College as a lecturer, teaching philosophy, divinity and history. He spent his entire year career there, ultimately becoming a dean, then warden of the college in Students and colleagues alike admired Reverend Spooner, describing him as wise and intelligent.

But they also remember him as somewhat clumsy, and he often reversed logic and transposed ideas. For instance, Spooner once spilled salt on the table at a university banquet. So he poured wine on the salt to clean it up - the complete opposite of the usual process. Based on that description, you'd think that word gaffes filled Spooner's lectures. But this was not true.

Like all of us, Spooner occasionally misspoke. For instance, he introduced a friend of his colleague, Dr. Child, as "Dr. Being in a room with Spooner required a little guesswork and interpretation, at least according to Oxford folklore.

Although he often denied them, Spooner sometimes confirmed the anecdotes and news stories relating his speech blunders. People certainly made such errors long before his time — but not with such frequency. A spoonerism is a slip of the tongue— a momentary confusion in the part of the brain that formulates speech. Spooner had a nervous tick that may have helped produce his permutations of speech. The laughter elicited by odd word pairings that would otherwise be everyday language inspires some actors and authors to ante up their wit.

English lends itself well to Spoonerisms because of its diverse set of sounds and fluid phonetics. As far as can be ascertained, the only example of a spoonerism actually said by Spooner is:. You will find as you grow older that the weight of rages will press harder and harder upon the employer. He is also widely reported to have acknowledged coinage of 'The Kinquering Congs Their Titles Take' in reference to a hymn but I can find no convincing evidence of that admission.

Spooner's reputation must have come from somewhere and, although no doubt exaggerated by Oxford undergraduates who had developed a fashion for nonsense-speak in the late 18th century, he probably uttered other examples that went unrecorded. More reliable are the accounts of ideas or words that demonstrate the occasional transpositions caused by his mild mental disorder:.

On one occasion he spilt salt on the tablecloth and poured claret on top of it. On a tour of his college he remarked on the darkness of a staircase before turning off all the lights and attempting to lead a party down the stairs in the dark.

He asked an acquaintance "Was it you or your brother who was killed in the war? Commenting on another acquaintance he remarked "Her late husband, you know, a very sad death - eaten by missionaries - poor soul!

Here's a list of spoonerisms that are often supposed to have been uttered by the reverend gentleman but come with the giveaway 'attributed to' label:. Far from being unintentional mix-ups, they were created entirely intentionally for humorous purposes.

But most of the famous spoonerisms are apocryphal. The Oxford provenance of most of these invented spoonerisms is apparent in their content.