Is It a Misspelling, or a Variant Spelling?

I like handmade signs so much. I love the personal touch that anything handwritten conveys. So I take time out to carefully look at and appreciate handmade signs when I come across them.

Like this one.

I saw this over the summer when I was on vacation with my family. We were in a small gold rush town in California.

‘ER’ or ‘RE’?

Look at that ‘ER’ in “accouterment.” It looks like the person writing it thought, “Hold on – is it ‘ER’ or ‘RE’?” Maybe they even wrote it out as ‘RE’ first and then switched it.

And then it could have been time for the store to open and they were rushed and their co-worker said, “Ah, it’s fine — just get it outside!”

I would have said it should be ‘RE.‘ But as it turns out, accouterment — according to Merriam-Webster — is an acceptable variant spelling for accoutrement. Other dictionaries list the ‘ER’ variant first.

Does it matter?

Perhaps the accouterment vendor has always spelled it this way — which, according to some style guides is the American spelling for the word, while ‘RE’ is the British spelling.

For this shop’s purposes, it really doesn’t matter. People were coming and going anyway. Customers were making purchases. It made me stop and pause and talk to my daughter about the spelling, and then talk about what exactly the word means anyway.

That’s what you want a good sign to do, right? Catch someone’s attention, draw them in. It worked in this case.

How to handle variant spellings

In professional writing, when it comes to variant spellings like this, it’s important to follow these best practices:

• Know what the spelling variations are; do a quick search to be sure.
• Be aware of which one is more widely recognized/accepted by your audience.
• Be consistent — choose one version and stick with it.

And if you’ll be using it often, add it to your in-house style guide.

___________

• How would you have spelled accoutrement before reading this?
• What’s a variant spelling you come across regularly?
• Have you seen any great handmade signs recently?

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