Made mention

Posted by ESC on March 17, 2000

In Reply to: What kind of phrase is this? posted by Terry on March 15, 2000

: I've heard the phrase "make mention" or "made mention" many time lately? While I believe this is
: using the word mention incorrectly, several individuals that I've asked after making the statement,
: indicate that was the way they were taught to use it?
: It sounds very silly to me, anyone have any ideas on this?
: Terry

I guess you could call it an idiom, a particular group or society's way of speaking. Here's an example, in the hills of West Virginia, instead of saying, "That dog didn't try to bite us," we might say, "That dog didn't offer to bite us."

I don't know why we said it that way. We just did. Just a little language quirk.