the.com/recantation
Saying 'never mind' loudly enough to undo what you swore under oath.
means The formal act of publicly taking back a statement, belief, or oath you previously held, usually under pressure or after a change of conviction.
from From Latin recantare — 're-' (back) plus 'cantare' (to sing, chant). Literally 'to sing back' or 'unsay' — the Romans pictured taking back a claim as singing a counter-song that cancels the first one. The word passed through French into English in the 1500s, picking up its weighty, often public and legal, overtones along the way — think of heretics forced to recant before a court.
- origin
- latin recantare, literally to sing again
- galileo
- famously recanted heliocentrism to avoid burning
- legal use
- witnesses recant, cases sometimes collapse
- irony
- the retraction often outlives the original claim