Date:  Wed, 28 Jan 1998 09:08:08 -0500
From:  Gregory {Greg} Downing <downingg[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]IS2.NYU.EDU>
Subject: Re: "zephyr" (= nothing)

At 08:27 AM 1/28/98 -0500, you (baragonasa[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]vax.vmi.edu) wrote:
>> >   I have no idea how the semantic development "zephyr" to "nothing"
>> > occurred. Can anyone help?
>>
>> This is just a guess, but it may be confusion with "cipher" (Brit.
>> spelling cypher), which of course means zero.
>
>"Cipher" is an interesting suggestion. Another pure guess might be that
>it's an extension of the use of "wind" to mean airy nothingness, as in
>"Oaths are but words, and words but wind."
>

Check zephyr in OED2 -- I did last night, and there are lots of derivative
and applied senses having to do with lightness or nothingness -- a kind of
light fabric, etc.

Maybe (cipher) + (the idea that some nothing-words begin with z [zero, zip,
the obscurely-derived but probably zero-related zilch]) + (zephyr's
connotations of lightness/nothingness) = zepyhr-as-zero????

Is it clear that "zephyr" as it was originally quoted on this thread is an
established usage, or a one-time thing (thus, perhaps, a de facto solecism)?

Gregory {Greg} Downing, at greg.downing[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]nyu.edu or downingg[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]is2.nyu.edu