Re: Novercia

[riley@tcgould.tn.cornell.edu (Daniel S. Riley)]

In article <626120494@bucc2.UUCP> pwh@bucc2.UUCP (Pete Hartman) writes:
>I hate to bust the Veronica bubble, but I think that's really an
>unlikely anagram.  I don't know where the word comes from, but I've
>got an album by Renaissance that is titled _Novercia_ with a picture
>of a nun on the front.  

Ummm, the only Renaissance (the group, that is) album I have with a nun
on the cover is _Novella_, not _Novercia_.  It's sitting right in front
of me, so I'm pretty sure about that.

>I also seem to have associations with the
>religious orders from my high school conversion to Catholicism, and
>seem to recall the novercia being associated with a convent in some
>fasion.

There's "novena", "a recitation of prayers and devotions for nine
consecutive days", from the Latin novenus, nine each.  I don't remember
hearing novercia in my days in Catholic schools.

I was going to be mention "noverca", for stepmother, but Ed beat me to
it.

-Dan Riley (riley@tcgould.tn.cornell.edu, cornell!batcomputer!riley)
-Wilson Lab, Cornell U.