I’ll stick with the leeches, thanks.

Dear Word Detective: I was reading a novel the other day that referred to one of the characters as having been “trepanned.” I was confused, because my understanding was that the word referred to drilling holes in something, often a skull, and I seemed to have missed the scene where the guy got his skull perforated. An obligatory search of Dictionary.com revealed that there is a secondary meaning of “trepan” as a verb — to trick or swindle — and, as a noun, — one who does the tricking or swindling — implying that one who is “trepanned” is one who has been tricked or swindled (something that made far more sense in the context of my novel than having holes bored in one’s head). My question, then, is this: are these two terms related? If so, what is the logic there, and if not, what is the origin of the latter definition? — Gwyn.

Well, I hope they’re not the same word, simply because I’ve always had a secret gnawing dread of having holes drilled in my noggin and would prefer not to have to think about it.

As it turns out, the “trepan” that refers to drilling holes in your head and the “trepan” which means “to swindle” (or the person or trick involved in a swindle) are not the same word, and there’s no real connection between the two words. Except maybe a little.

The earlier of the “trepans” to appear in English was the “hole in the head” one, around 1400. The noun “trepan,” from which the verb was formed, is defined as “a surgical saw for cutting out pieces of bone, especially from the skull,” and was derived, via French, from the Greek “trypan,” meaning “to bore.” “Trepan” as a noun has also been used to mean a contraption used to bore holes in the walls of fortresses under siege, as well as a shaft used to drill holes in the ground for a variety of purposes. The associated verb “to trepan,” meaning “to bore through bone, particularly the skull” appeared at about the same time (“Prince Rupert is … so bad, that he doth now yield to be trapan’d,” Diary, Samuel Pepys, 1667). “Trepan” has also been used since the early 20th century to mean “to bore a hole through something (wood, metal, etc.) so as to remove a core in one piece” (“The smaller holes are best bored, but large holes can be trepanned in order to save a useful piece of material,” 1970).

“Trepan” in the “hoodwink” sense first appeared as criminal underworld slang in the mid-17th century both as a noun (meaning both “someone who tricks or traps victims” and the trick or trap itself) and as a verb meaning “to ensnare, beguile, cheat” (“Ten of those Rogues had trapann’d him out of 500 Crowns,” 1662). As you can see from that 1662 quotation, the original spelling of this “trepan” was “trapan,” and the most likely explanation of the word is that “trapan” was simply derived from the verb “to trap.” So, in origin, the two “trepans” are completely separate words.

Now things get a little weird. The later change in the spelling of “trapan” to “trepan” may have arisen at least in part because “trepan” in the “bore a hole in your head” sense was a far more well-known word than “trapan,” which was fairly obscure thieves’ slang. (It also probably didn’t help that “trepan” in the “bore” meaning was, at that time, occasionally spelled “trapan.”) The Oxford English Dictionary also suggests that the switch from the spelling “trapan” to “trepan” occurred because people thought “trapan” must be a figurative use of “trepan,” i.e., that people who were beguiled or cheated were metaphorically being “bored into” by the con artist. That apparently made so much sense to so many people that both words are now spelled “trepan.”

Much classier than “stick out,” I guess. But it’s still a freakin’ tree.

Dear Word Detective: I had lunch with a friend today and we got to talking about Christmas trees (we talk about all sorts of stuff).  He described his pre-lighted tree as having lights that “sat proud of the branches.” I don’t believe I ever heard anyone use that term in actual conversation. Where does it come from? He thought woodworking. I said, “Or maybe it’s nautical.” He just sneered. — Bob McGill.

Well, there you go. That’s why I don’t have friends. Always sneering at you, undermining your confidence by mocking your socks, whispering things to your dog when they think you’re not looking, posting pictures of livestock on Facebook tagged with your name, and nominating you to A&E for some horrible reality show about untidy collectors. They claim they care about you, but I’ll take a house full of loyal ducks any day.

I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone actually say “sat proud” either, and I’m sort of envious. I once used the word “fungible” in a chat about furnace filters with the guy at the hardware store downtown and I’m pretty sure he thought I was talking about mold. I just like the word. It comes in handy, at least in some alternate universe in which I don’t happen to live.

“Proud,” of course, is a venerable English adjective meaning, as the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) puts it, “Feeling greatly honored, pleased, or satisfied by something which or someone who does one credit; acutely aware of some honor done to oneself, taking pride in something” or “Having a high or exalted opinion of one’s own worth or importance.” The root of “proud,” which first appeared in Old English, was the Old French “prod,” which meant “good, noble, prudent, wise, profitable” and similar things, which in turn came ultimately from the Latin “prodesse,” meaning “to be of value; to be good.” The noun “pride” is actually derived from the adjective “proud,” and, oddly enough, “proud” is also a noun in its own right, meaning “a proud, noble or stately person or thing” or a group of people who are proud (“The blazings of the proud will goe out in a stench and smoke,” 1628). It can even be an adverb, specifically in the phrase “to do [a person] proud,” meaning “to be a source of pride” or “to treat someone well” (“Lunch at Pauline’s. She did me proud — a half-bottle of champagne and a delicious meal,” 1986).

Meanwhile, back at “proud” the adjective, a variety of extended senses gradually developed over the centuries. “Proud” was used to mean “noble” or “stately,” “vigorous” or “valiant” (“proud warrior”), or, applied to a turbulent sea or river, “strong, tumultuous.” Of a plant or crop, “proud” meant “full of sap” or “luxuriant in growth,” especially when said plant was growing out of season (“If the winter has been open and mild, the autumn-wheat plant will have grown luxuriantly, .. so … that it may have become ‘proud,’ that is, in a precocious state of forwardness for the season,” 1844). “Proud” in this sense is also used to describe the first buds of a tree or other plant in spring.

Your friend’s use of “sat proud” to describe Christmas lights projecting notably from the branches of his “pre-lighted” tree is derived from this sense. It’s a use that first appeared in print in Scotland and Northern England in the early 19th century meaning “projecting from a surface; slightly raised,” and it can be applied to just about anything that projects or stands out from its environment (even, apparently, in automobile design: “The horn push, sited right across the central spoke of the steering wheel, is well proud of the spoke and this gives rise to occasional, accidental blasts,” 1974). “Sit proud” is a form of the established idiom “stand proud,” meaning simply “stick out” or “project.” This sense does seem to be used often in carpentry to describe a part of something that, whether by design or by accident (e.g., an errant floor board), sticks out, so your friend was onto something in his “woodworking” guess. But there’s no call for sneering.