Word: archaicism
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...Easy as Lying. The recorder derives its name from the archaic meaning of the verb "record," that is, "to sing like a bird." Its origins have been traced to the 12th century, but its heyday came in the late 17th and early 18th century, when Bach, Purcell, Telemann, Vivaldi and Handel wrote a wealth of music for it. Shakespeare, Bacon, Milton and Pepys celebrated its endearing combination of solemnity and sweetness, and King Henry VIII was an avid noodler on his collection of 77 recorders. As orchestras grew larger, however, the gentle voice of the recorder was replaced...
...husband's estate to his relatives. Equally alarming to newly affluent Americans is the high cost of dying with a will. For good reasons, a will must be proved valid (probated) in state courts known variously as probate, surrogate, orphans or chancery. Unfortunately, many such courts' archaic methods can tie up an estate for years, devour 20% or more of its value in legal fees-and force the dead to subsidize politicians in one of U.S. law's darkest scandals...
...years it has been an unwritten rule, perfectly understandable although rather archaic, that the Israeli Philharmonic Orchestra must not perform the works of German Composer Richard Wagner. Richard Strauss was verboten as well until 1953, when Violinist Jascha Heifetz played a Strauss sonata -a performance that later moved a zealot to clout him on the right wrist with an iron bar outside his hotel. Now the orchestra's directors have decided that "the time has come for a change . . . because of the paramount demands of freedom of art." So, presumably, Wagner and Strauss will now be heard in Israel...
Exterior Signs. It is now. Aware that unbalanced government budgets were a key factor in Brazil's rampaging inflation, President Humberto Castello Branco and his revolutionary military regime rammed through a tough universal income-tax law that set realistic tax rates* streamlined the archaic collection system, made tax dodgers liable to two years in prison. In to run the operation moved Orlando Travancas, 47, a reform-bent tax official who has weeded out dishonest inspectors, set up a school to train new ones, and installed ten computers to keep track of returns...
...spectators. An estimated 8,500,000 Americans play tennis, but only a handful ever attend top amateur or professional tournaments. The reason, according to James Van Alen, 63, president of the tennis Hall of Fame, is the sport's 85-year-old scoring system, which belabors spectators with archaic terminology ("love," "deuce," "advantage"), places no time limit on the duration of a match, and encourages a brand of play-the wham-slam "big game"-that often makes the match a bore to watch. Van Alen's answer: a totally different scoring system called VASSS (for Van Alen Simplified...