Steinmetz, Sol. (2008). Semantic antics: how and why words change meaning. New York: Random House Reference.
A great book on the shift of word meanings over time in the English language.
In addition to the generous glossary of stories of specific words, the “Introduction,” (pp. vii- xiii) is an excellent, succinct summary of the subject. The various ways that word meanings shift over time are outlined.
The entries themselves are well-written, without extraneous bits of entertainment, irrelevance, or silliness.
Speaking of “silly,” here is an excerpt from the book’s entry on that subject:
“The word silly is a classic example of pejoration, or gradual worsening of meaning . In early Middle English (around 1200), sely… meant “happy, blissful, blessed, fortunate,” …. The original meaning was followed by a succession of narrower ones, including “spiritually blessed, pious, holy, good, innocent, harmless,” …. As the form…changed … in the 1500s, the earlier meanings passed into increasingly less favorable senses such as “weak, feeble, insignificant,”…. (p.207).
The great joy of this book is that, by learning the histories of words, and the process by which words change, you learn more about individual words and about how the English language works. Even though we cannot directly use the outdated meaning of words, like silly, knowing the word’s past helps us understand its coloration. So often words have specific shades of meanings we are aware of but can scarcely understand. Here is a tool to help us with that understanding.