Didache 12:5

Maurice A. O'Sullivan mauros at iol.ie
Mon Feb 21 11:23:10 EST 2000


At 09:43 21/02/00 -0500, Stephen C. Carlson wrote:
>To my American ear, this neutral meaning of "monger" is unfamiliar,
>and the word when used does have a pejorative connotation.  For
>example, in the 80s, it was not uncommon to hear Ronald Reagan
>called a "warmonger."  Your mileage will vary, of course, in other
>English speaking countries.

Stephen:
The realm of shops labelled "ironmonger" these days in the U.K is
deliberately preserved village shop-fronts, usually in tourist haunts, 
theme-parks, and seff-consciously "archaic" name-plates.

The pejorative connotations of --monger are long establshed; the SOED gives:

usu. derog., a person who promotes or carries on a petty or disreputable 
traffic in something specified. Usu. as 2nd elem. of comb. OE

And the two examples cited are hardly fresh-minted:

.C. KINGSLEY My only fear is people will fancy me a verbal-inspiration-monger.
V. WOOLF He's a priest, a mystery-monger.

As you say, "warmonger" is widely understood everywhere, as is the even 
older "scaremonger".

No, I think "Christmonger" is good coinage --- and robust, too, as befits a 
term of abuse!

One alternative that comes to mind is " Christ-peddler", [ on the lines of 
"dope-peddler",] but i suspect the "-peddler" bit is not as common on your 
side  the Atlantic
as it is on mine.

Regards
Maurice
Maurice A. O'Sullivan  [ Bray, Ireland ]
mauros at iol.ie

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