Talk:expound

RFV discussion: May 2016–March 2017

The following information has failed Wiktionary's verification process (permalink).

Failure to be verified means that insufficient eligible citations of this usage have been found, and the entry therefore does not meet Wiktionary inclusion criteria at the present time. We have archived here the disputed information, the verification discussion, and any documentation gathered so far, pending further evidence.
Do not re-add this information to the article without also submitting proof that it meets Wiktionary's criteria for inclusion.

---

expound

Rfv-sense: "To lay open; to expose to view; to examine or exposit." What does this actually mean? It is not mentioned in the OED. ---> Tooironic (talk) 12:47, 16 May 2016 (UTC)

Perhaps it refers either to laying some physical thing open to view with the eyes, or to revealing something, as opposed to the other sense (to explain and lay a topic open to understanding with the mind). I can find some citations where the object of the verb is a physical thing rather than a concept, but even there it seems to refer to "explaining" the thing, not the RFVed sense. For example:

• 1639, Michael Jermin, A Commentary: Upon the Whole Booke of Ecclesiastes, chapter 9, page 343:

  One such righteous man, one such wise man, is able in danger to deliver a City, for so it followeth. [...] They who expound the city to be the body of man, expound this poore man to be synderesin & dictamen rationis, [...]

- -sche (discuss) 17:02, 16 May 2016 (UTC)

The usex in Webster's 1913 had the object of the sense in question being "both his pockets", ie, something physical, not a topic of discussion. The sense was labelled obsolete. But even Webster 1913 didn't use the verb exposit in the definiens. DCDuring TALK 12:14, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

RFV-failed. Webster was apparently referring to a quotation of some Hudibras, "He expounded both his pockets." - -sche (discuss) 03:47, 18 March 2017 (UTC)