What Does Mnemonic Mean

Mnemonic devices are those handy verbal tools that help people remember the names or patterns of larger data items. A classic example of such a device is the little ditty most of us were taught as children, the one that begins “Thirty days hath September…” That's a simple way to remember the lengths of the months, one that manages to stick with us well into adulthood. I don’t know about you, but the phrase “…all the rest have thirty-one…” still comes in handy many decades after I learned that song; even though I’ve since learned that it doesn't delve deeply enough into the formula for assigning Leap Years.

The word “mnemonic” – that initial M is silent, so it’s pronounced as though it were spelled “nemonic” – is rooted in the name of the Greek goddess of memory, Mnemosyne. Like many other names of Greek gods, her name is itself a bit of a mouthful:
Biv – Old Roy helps us remember the order of colors in the rainbow (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet)
King Philip came over for ginger snaps – Phil helps biology students remember the names and order of the different taxonomy levels (kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus, species)
My very educated mother just served us nice pizza –This now-outdated device for remembering the names an order of the planets in our solar system (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn Uranus, Neptune, Pluto) recently changed. Pluto’s recent demotion forced rewording, however – it’s now rendered “My very educated mother just served us nothing”…
Every good boy deserves fun – That’s how beginning music students remember the lines on the musical treble clef. “F” can also stand for fudge or favo(u)r, as in a decades-old album by the Moody Blues.
She makes him eat Oreos – the order of the Great Lakes from west to east (upstream to downstream, actually: Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie, Ontario)
My dear Aunt Sally – That’s the order of arithmetic operations (multiply, divide, add, subtract)

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