Dear Frank
Your local comprehensive school is a
good example of accepting the natural
inclination to getting up later and
later. By shifting from 9-4 to 10-5
they will precisely nullify the effect
of summer time! Tee hee!
> I have been rebuked for spelling
> "dialist" ... instead of "diallist".
This is interesting as is your defence:
> In my defence, "dialist" is the only
> spelling offered in the Shorter Oxford
> Dictionary.
Notwithstanding its place of origin I am a
huge fan of the Oxford English Dictionary.
There is nothing remotely equivalent in
other languages.
That said, I think that whoever oversaw
the relevant entry was confused. The
full entry in the OED is:
dialist [yes, a single "l"]
A maker of dials; one skilled in dialling.
1652 T. STIRRUP (title), Horometria; or
the Complete Diallist.
1703 MOXON Mech. Exerc. 346 Helps to a
young Dyalist for his more orderly and
quick making of Dyals.
1776 G. CAMPBELL Philos. Rhet. (1801)
I. Introd., The architect, the navigator,
the dialist.
So you have a choice. The earliest, 1652,
is diallist, then you have dyalist and then
dialist. I definitely go for the first and
cannot understand why the OED doesn't!
With the related word "dialling", that spelling
comes first with "dialing" second.
I note your other words:
> We also have "royalist", "federalist",
> "herbalist", "socialist", even "evangelist"
> and many more.
True, but we don't have royalling, federalling,
herballing, socialling or evangelling so I do
not see these as valid counter-examples.
Of course the greatest dictionary of all is
the BSS Sundial Glossary where curly-brackets
are used to denote "Alternative spellings to
the *preferred* ones".
Several pages in you will see:
diallist {dialist}
So, diallist must be "preferred"!!
All the best
Frank
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