Two timer

Recently I heard the misuse of the word "duplicity". While hilarious for its implication--that is, the number of widgets on facebook defrauds the user--it was, after all, cringe-inspiring. The intended word redundancy, and, other than the sonic parody of the word "double", duplicity did not communicate this idea.

However it seemed odd a word such as duplicity (i.e. a word containing a form of "duple-") would have nothing in common with the root of double. An online etymology dictionary confirms this suspicion. Duplicity can be traced to Middle French duplicite, a derivative of the Late Latin duplicitatem (nom. duplicitas), meaning "doubleness". Notably, the Medieval Latin root, duplex (gen. duplicis), equates to "ambiguity". Hence, the root is grounded in the concept of double-speak and being two-faced.

While still a misuse, exchanging fraudulence for redundancy is not that far off.