Chrysti The Wordsmith: Hocus Pocus

Greetings and welcome to Christie the wordsmith. English speakers have been using the rhyming expression hocus pocus for centuries as a synonym of deceit trickery or flim flam hocus pocus. The etymology of hocus pocus may be provided in a quotation from John Tillotson Archbishop of Canterbury from 60 91 to 60 94 Tillotson wrote in all probability those words Hocus Pocus are nothing else but a corruption of Hoke asked corpus by way of ridiculous imitation of the priests of the Church of Rome and their trick of transubstantiation. So the archbishop was saying that hocus pocus evokes the Latin words uttered in a Catholic mass. At the moment that the host turns to flesh and those words are Hoke essed corpus. This is the body. It's said that magicians and conjurors in an attempt to dazzle audiences would shout out the corruption of the solemn Latin formula hokus pokus at the climax of a trick

by the 17th century the magicians acts of trickery and prestidigitation became known generally as hocus pocus. Then at about the same time hocus pocus had become a nickname for both magicians and jugglers. Sir Thomas Herbert an English traveller and historian wrote in 16 34 of a magician he saw during his travels to the Near East. Herbert wrote a Persian hokus pokus performed rare tricks with hands and feet. I'm Christie the wordsmith. Today word lovers Christie the wordsmith is sponsored by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and Zoot enterprises a high tech firm in Bozeman Montana offering challenging careers and innovative solutions for the financial services industry. Zoot web dot com.