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Shouldn't it be ' a VERY splendored thing'.

Does MANY have any grammatical explanation here?
Is that an everyday English expression?

Thanks

Think, 'multifaceted', 'complex' and 'with many aspects and dimensions'. That says a lot more than just 'It's very nice' (or, indeed, even 'It's very splendid').

Are there any "many splendoured things" other than "love"? Sounds like a case for the Lexical Approach...

I just did a search for 'splendoured' in my Oxford Pop-up Reference Shelf CD-ROM, and found the following in the Quotations section:

Francis Thompson 1859–1907
English poet

The angels keep their ancient places;—
Turn but a stone, and start a wing!
'Tis ye, 'tis your estrangèd faces,
That miss the many-splendoured thing.
‘The Kingdom of God’ (1913)

Apart from the above quote, which almost certainly was the inspiration for the title of the song referred to by cft, there are probably very few uses of this exact form/phrase (I'd hesitate to call it a collocation). 'Splendour' though is of course used as a mass noun (and sometimes in a countable sense/use also):

splendour (US splendor)noun [mass noun] magnificent and splendid appearance; grandeur: the barren splendour of the Lake District.n (splendours) magnificent features or qualities: the splendours of the imperial court.

What does "to splendour" mean anyway? I splendour; you splendour; he/she/it splendours? There's a usage that's gone by the wayside. I'm going to look it up in my OED.

-Piggy

Pink Piggy wrote:What does "to splendour" mean anyway? I splendour; you splendour; he/she/it splendours? There's a usage that's gone by the wayside. I'm going to look it up in my OED.

-Piggy

Where did you get the idea there was a verb form-use from?

Duh! I see, 'many-splendoured' (participle?). Sorry, not concentrating here and losing track...brain power...failing...

I guess 'many-splendoured' is just a quirky, condensed/combined way of expressing the less poetic proposition(s) that 'Love is a splendid and multifaceted thing - it has many splendours' (as I intimated to cft right at the start); we can't get to 'thing' from 'Love has many splendours', or to 'many' from 'Love is a splendid thing'.

That is, it inventively combines and blurs the adjective and noun meanings through the creation of the one-off form. I don't think we were ever meant to assume we should start speaking with a verb form-use on this basis. But it will be interesting to hear what the OED has to say!

Fluff, I agree that it's not a collocation. The reason I called it a case for the Lexical Approach is that the phrase Love is a many splendoured thing is probably best analysed as a lexical "chunk" in its own right and there isn't any insight to be had by breaking it down any further.

Your quotation from Francis Thompson is certainly interesting but of little interest outside of literary/historical circles. CFT's question is exactly the kind of think my more "earnest" students might ask in class ("Lol, I was reading my dictionary last night and came across this word...") and the only sensible answer is "It's a set phrase with no generative power".

That's okay Fluffy, nice to see even your brain power slows down at times!

Here is the Webster's Third International definition of "splendour ed/ing" as a verbal adjective:

to proceed gloriously, radiantly, or resplendently; to endow with splendour (e.g. The winter night is splendoured by the stars)

So that means that, refering to our quote, love either proceeds resplendently or is endowed with splendour. Since it is "many" splendoured, one would therefore lean to the second meaning, and would conclude that love is endowed with many splendours! That solves the problem of why we'd use 'many'.

We have developed a tendency to use 'multi' in this sort of usage with a participle, but I kind of like the 'many' usage. Can anyone think of any more collocations with many+participle?

-Piggy

p.s. Please don't take me too seriously in all this. It's just a bit of verbal fun.

Hmm, interesting stuff, Pink Piggy! Thanks for the info from Webster's Third. I tend to rely on my NODE too much, and in the process of racking my brains over words that aren't in it (for what I think are ultimately sound lexicographical reasons and decisions) forget that there are larger, potentially helpful resources to be had in helping explain the more obscure, archaic or colourful items of the language to learners (as I've intimated, understanding a one-off form isn't really a problem for native speakers already very familiar with the more usual forms of a lemma/word family). But the brain-racking's half the fun, isn't it!

Hey Fluffy (are you a Captain Underpants Fan?),

I have a little confession to make. I'm not familiar with the term "one-off". Could you explicate? Thanks!

- Piggy

ps. If you do, you are splendoured!

a 'one-off' is a simple example of its kind, unlikely to be repeated

Thanks, SJ! I was a little busy...

The NEW OXFORD Dictionary of ENGLISH

one-off informal, chiefly Brit.adjective done, made, or happening only once and not repeated: one-off tax deductible donations to charity.
noun something done, made, or happening only once, not as part of a regular sequence: the meeting is a one-off.n a person who is unusual or unique, especially in an admirable way: he's a one-off, no one else has his skills.

'Love is a many-splintered thing'

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