Writing a period piece? Here's a great Google site to check words & phrases in use...

[60WordsPerHour Regular Find all posts View Profile Close 60WordsPerHour]

... over time.

https://books.google.com/ngrams

You enter the words and phrases, choose the date bounds, and it searches a its enormous digitised book database for occurrences and charts them.

You can have all sorts of fun seeing when words and phrases appeared, spiked, ebbed or climbed. And do face-offs (i.e Sigmund Freud vs Carl Jung).

[Margie Kaptanoglu Regular Find all posts View Profile Close Margie Kaptanoglu]

Writing a period piece? Here's a great Google site to check words & phrases in use...

Very cool. Thanks!

[Anointed Regular Find all posts View Profile Close Anointed]

Re: Writing a period piece?

This would have been nice when I was writing my period script. I spent well over a hundred hours scouring NYT archives and period books to get what that search would perform in less than an hour. Definitely bookmarked 60Words!

[LauriD Member Find all posts View Profile Close LauriD]

Re: Writing a period piece?

I thought this was something like timelines of history, which would be really helpful, but it's more like just an info-graphic so I'm not really clear on the point...

[JoeBanks Member Find all posts View Profile Close JoeBanks]

Re: Writing a period piece?

I thought this was something like timelines of history, which would be really helpful, but it's more like just an info-graphic so I'm not really clear on the point...

if you need to know whether a word or phrase would be anachronistic as used, it can give you a reasonable idea

[oceanbluesky User Find all posts View Profile Close oceanbluesky]

Re: Writing a period piece? Here's a great Google site

would be cool if it were possible to translate a contemporary phrase into an historical idiom...for example "Shut your mouth!" or "That's total bullshit." ...a future version of Wolfram Alpha may provide a literal translation of 4th century Attic Greek "Keep your lips together." or 12th Century Danish "That's the cat's hair." : )

if there aren't cross-referenced idiomatic phrase books...soon databases?

[60WordsPerHour Regular Find all posts View Profile Close 60WordsPerHour]

Re: Writing a period piece?

I thought this was something like timelines of history, which would be really helpful, but it's more like just an info-graphic so I'm not really clear on the point...

Here's an example.

The word "scientist" was coined in 1833. "Natural philosopher" was the term people had used before and for some time after.

To check when the word really came into usage, you can enter it into the search. You'll get this:

https://books.google.com/ngrams/grap...entist%3B%2Cc0

As you can see, it picked up from around the mid/late 1860s.

[LauriD Member Find all posts View Profile Close LauriD]

Re: Writing a period piece?

Here's an example.

The word "scientist" was coined in 1833. "Natural philosopher" was the term people had used before and for some time after.

To check when the word really came into usage, you can enter it into the search. You'll get this:

https://books.google.com/ngrams/grap...entist%3B%2Cc0

As you can see, it picked up from around the mid/late 1860s.

OK, I get it now and that IS useful.... But I wonder if many screenwriters will pay attention? Always drives me nuts when characters in period pieces say things like "OK."

[BurOak Member Find all posts View Profile Close BurOak]

Re: Writing a period piece?

OK, I get it now and that IS useful.... But I wonder if many screenwriters will pay attention? Always drives me nuts when characters in period pieces say things like "OK."

Agreed. Watched an old western recently where one of the characters exclaimed "Wowwee!"

[BurOak Member Find all posts View Profile Close BurOak]

Re: Writing a period piece? Here's a great Google site

would be cool if it were possible to translate a contemporary phrase into an historical idiom...for example "Shut your mouth!" or "That's total bullshit." ...a future version of Wolfram Alpha may provide a literal translation of 4th century Attic Greek "Keep your lips together." or 12th Century Danish "That's the cat's hair." : )

if there aren't cross-referenced idiomatic phrase books...soon databases?

Excellent idea.

[BurOak Member Find all posts View Profile Close BurOak]

Here's a great Google site to check words & phrases in use...

... over time.

https://books.google.com/ngrams

You enter the words and phrases, choose the date bounds, and it searches a its enormous digitised book database for occurrences and charts them.

You can have all sorts of fun seeing when words and phrases appeared, spiked, ebbed or climbed. And do face-offs (i.e Sigmund Freud vs Carl Jung).

Excellent resource. Thank you!

[ewtaylor Regular Find all posts View Profile Close ewtaylor]

Re: Writing a period piece?

Some odd years ago I would partake in "hardcore" Civil War reenacting. We had to walk the walk and talk the talk.

This is a good resource for 19th century slang: http://mess1.homestead.com/Nineteent...Dictionary.pdf