[‘ Use of more words than are necessary; redundancy or superfluity of expression, pleonasm; an instance of this.']
Pronunciation: Brit. /ˌpɛrɪˈsɒlədʒi/, U.S. /ˌpɛrəˈsɑlədʒi/
Forms: 15–17 19– *perissology*, 17 *parissology* /irreg./.
Etymology: < post-classical Latin /perissologia/ use of more words than are necessary (4th or 5th cent. in grammarians; already in classical Latin (Quintilian) as a Greek word) < Hellenistic Greek /περισσολογία/ < ancient Greek /περισσός/ redundant (see perissad adj. and n.) + -λογία/ -logy comb. form. Compare Greek /περισσολόγος speaking too much, in scholia (medieval Greek or earlier) on Aristophanes Knights 89. Compare Middle French /perissologia/ (1521), French /périssologie/ (1710).
For earlier use of post-classical Latin /perissologia/ in an English context compare the following:
1550 R. Sherry /Treat. Schemes & Tropes/ sig. Bviiiv, /Perissologia. Sermo superfluus/, when a sentence is added, ye matter therby made neuer the waightier.
/Rhetoric/.
Use of more words than are necessary; redundancy or superfluity of expression, pleonasm; an instance of this.
Humorously pedantic in later quots.
1583 W. Fulke /Def. Transl. Script./ sig. Cvv, Haue not the most eloquent authors, vsed Hyperbatons, Perissologies, and other figures that are counted faultes of speech?
1656 T. Blount /Glossographia/, /Perissology/, superfluous speaking.
1753 J. Man /Censure & Exam. of Thomas Ruddiman’s Philol. Notes/ v. 423 According to him, Cicero must be guilty of a perissology in many places.
1776 G. Campbell /Philos. of Rhetoric/ I. ii. iii. 426 If we should say the alcoran, we should fall into a gross parissology.
1910 /Amer. Jrnl. Philol./ *31* 215 He has a liking for paraphrase and perissology, but the most characteristic feature is an..avoidance of similar words.
1975 /Man/ *10* 164/1 A paper..whose inspissated perissology obfuscates its own significativeness.
1994 /Age (Melbourne, Austral.)/(Nexis) 3 Dec. 8, I cannot leave out perissology… We are very given to that.