this post was submitted on 21 Apr 2025
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[–] Agrivar@lemmy.world -4 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

Farewell to spelling correctly.

[–] merde@sh.itjust.works 13 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

cats recite in Middle English, hence the "farewel"

[–] CrayonRosary@lemmy.world 6 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

WikiDiff says it's simply misspelled, and quotes very old examples of "farewell".

https://wikidiff.com/farewel/farewell

Fucking kittens don't know shit.

[–] merde@sh.itjust.works 6 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (1 children)

Etymology

From Middle English farewel, from fare wel! (and the variants with the personal pronoun "fare ye well" and "fare you well" used in the Renaissance), an imperative expression, possibly further derived from Old English *far wel!, equivalent to fare (“to fare, travel, journey”) +‎ well. Compare Scots farewele, fairweill (“farewell”), Saterland Frisian Foarwäil (“farewell”), West Frisian farwol (“farewell”), German Fahrwol, Fahrwohl, East Frisian forwal, Dutch vaarwel (“farewell (sadly)”), Danish farvel (“farewell”), Norwegian farvel (“farewell”), Swedish farväl (“farewell”), Faroese farvæl (“goodbye”), Icelandic far vel (“farewell”). The extensive list of cognates suggests a postulated ultimate Proto-Germanic phrase of origin, possibly something akin to far wela.

[–] CrayonRosary@lemmy.world 3 points 2 weeks ago
[–] zabadoh@ani.social 13 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

The quotes are from John Milton's poem Paradise Lost, which was published in 1667.

Here's the original text to the "farwel hope" quote

https://archive.org/details/bim_early-english-books-1641-1700_paradise-lost_milton-john_1667/page/n89/mode/2up

It's definitely not modern English, although a 1905 edition is the first thing that pops up in a Google search, and that is in recognizably modern English

[–] Retreaux@lemmy.world 2 points 2 weeks ago

Farewell to contextual subtlety and salutations to "Um, Actually-".