Writing Time
graffiti (n.): Esp. in archaeological contexts: a drawing or piece of writing scribbled or scratched on a wall or other surface. A borrowing from Italian < plural of graffito < graffio a scratch, verb graffiare to scratch < a derivative of classical Latin graphium. Derived from the Greek word γραφειν (graphein): to draw or write, originally to scrape or scratch, from the Proto-Indo-European root word gerbh, to scratch or carve.
palimpsest (n.): A parchment or other writing surface on which the original text has been effaced or partially erased, and then overwritten by another; a manuscript in which later writing has been superimposed on earlier (effaced) writing. A borrowing from Latin < palimpsestus parchment which has been written on again < Hellenistic Greek παλίμψηστος scraped again, also παλίμψηστον a parchment from which writing has been erased < ancient Greek πάλιν again + ψηστός < ψῆν to rub smooth (< the same Indo-European base as Sanskrit bhas-, psā- to crush, chew, devour) + epenthetic σ + τός, suffix forming verbal adjectives.
All those borrowed words, to describe how we write time, again and again, over and over. How we scratch and scrape, and write and draw, and try to make our mark through all these borrowed words, and times, and places. Biographies of people and place and time, entangled in the present, laid down as sediments, written in stone.
Antonia Thomas 07/05/2024
Notes: Definitions and etymologies sourced from Oxford English Dictionary Online (https://www.oed.com), accessed 07/05/2024