Thursday, January 07, 2010

Summation of Summation

Here's Hillary's English:

This is also a man – (applause) – who summated the 14,400-foot Mount Rainier, one of the most difficult climbs in the continental United States.


But what is the definition of summate?

Well, here it is:

sum·mate
v. sum·ma·ted, sum·ma·ting, sum·mates
v.tr.
To sum up: summate a legal argument.
v.intr.
To form or constitute a cumulative effect.


This adds:

transitive verb : to add together


As a lawyer, Mrs. Clinton probably used it often, to sum up a case.

But to mean: to reach the summit?

Or did a State Department transcripist misspell it instead of summitted?

But then we have submitted.

English is complicate at times.

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