| Kenneth G. Wilson (1923–). The Columbia Guide to Standard American English. 1993. |
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| errant, arrant (adjs.) |
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| Errant means “wandering, off course, lost,” and so “mistaken,” as in The errant child needed direction, not punishment. Arrant comes from the same root, but in this case the wandering leads away from and never returns to the right path; today arrant means only “very bad, “notorious,” “incorrigible,” as in He’s an arrant criminal; he makes no pretense about it. They can be homophones, pronounced ER-int, but arrant is more frequently pronounced A-rint. | 1 |
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| | | The Columbia Guide to Standard American English. Copyright © 1993 Columbia University Press. |
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