Whereeee's Johnny?

On February 28 my blog ended with the statement that I would just have to continue my search for the pedantic word for introduction.

Does encomium “fit the bill”? Not really; encomium is listed as a synonym for panegyric or eulogy. It is a formal expression of high praise. Its current use, though, is not of a speech such as a eulogy; it is more an expression than a speech. Nor does it have a sense of high praise and speech such as panegyric. It merely has the high praise part.

Encomium comes originally from the Greek word enkomion, which in one source referred to a “laudatory ode or eulogy.” Another source translated it as a hymn to the victor. It comes from en-, meaning “in”, and komos, meaning banquet, procession, merrymaking, or revel. So it originally was laudatory speaking in the context of a banquet or merrymaking. According to the definition a toast could be an encomium. It was first used in English in 1589, but I don’t know where.

A eulogy is almost never used for anything other than an address or reflection on the death of someone. It was first used in the mid-15th century, and came from the Greek word eulogia, which meant "praise." That word came from eu- "well" and -logia "speaking." Logia came from the more familiar word logos "discourse, or word." Eu legein meant "speak well of." Eulogia is used in both the Greek New Testament and the Septuagint.

A valedictory, on the other hand, is almost never used to refer to anything other than an address at graduation. It comes from the Latin words vale, farewell, and dicere, to say. It comes from the 1610s. It still means to say farewell.

Peroration is the word with the most history in English, and is also the one furthest from our quest for a substitute for introduction. It actually refers to the conclusion of a presentation, the summation of a legal argument. Since those are the most important parts for “driving home” a point, the word has also come to mean high-flown or bombastic speech. It comes from the Latin per, through or to the end, and orare, to pray, plead or speak. It came to English in about 1440.

When an encomium becomes overblown it becomes apotheosis. Apotheosis has an interesting etymology to me; it comes from the Greek but is used in Late Latin (or Latin – my sources disagree) as a transliteration of the Greek. It has been used as a noun since the 1600s, but only formed into a verb in 1760. Its root word is theos, the Greek word for God. Apo- is a prefix that normally means “from”, and one of my sources uses it, explaining its etymology as originally apotheos “from a God”, then developing into apotheoun (to deify), a form of which is apotheosis. My other source says that the use of apo is special, being used in this case to mean “change”.

So the search continues.