Synchresis

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The shortening or omission of a syllable within a word for metrical purposes in verse
2. A poetic device in which a syllable is dropped or contracted to fit the meter of a line
3. The elision or compression of a syllable in poetry to maintain proper rhythmic structure

Etymology: "Synchresis" is a modern coinage, a blend of "synchronism" and "synthesis." Both parts come from Greek roots: "synchronism" from "synchronos," meaning "happening at the same time," and "synthesis" from "synthesis," meaning "a putting together." The blend fused the two words' shared "syn-" prefix and their overlapping sounds into a single form. The term's sense is unusually specific. It names the persistent recurrence of the same errors in speech and writing, which crop up again and again in separate instances across each century as individual speakers misspeak and writers miswrite. The idea is that these mistakes are not inherited from a single source but keep being independently reinvented, so the same slip appears over and over, unconnected. The word is recorded first in 1994, so it sits among the newest terms in this set of "syn-" words.