Word of the Day Thread

[ITS ME!]

chrestomathy \ kres-TOM-uh-thee \ , noun;

1.
A collection of selected literary passages.



Quotes:
I had learned to read Sanscrit and to translate easy passages in the chrestomathy , and devoted myself with special zeal to the study of the Latin grammar and prosody.
-- Georg Ebers, The Story of My Life from Childhood to Manhood

This little chrestomathy preserves almost the only words of Atticus to have survived from antiquity.
-- Peter White, Cicero in Letters



Origin:
Chrestomathy literally means "useful to learn" in Greek, from the roots chres- meaning "to use" and math- meaning "to learn."

[ITS ME!]

demiurge \ DEM-ee-urj \ , noun;
1.
Philosophy. A. Platonism. The artificer of the world. B. (In the Gnostic and certain other systems) a supernatural being imagined as creating or fashioning the world in subordination to the Supreme Being, and sometimes regarded as the originator of evil.

2.
(In many states of ancient Greece) a public official or magistrate.



Quotes:
Larger than a character, the river is a manifest presence, a demiurge to support the man and the boy, a deity to betray them, feed them, all but drown them, fling them apart, float them back together.
-- Norman Mailer, The Spooky Art

The gnostics think this world was created by a bad god— a demiurge —who wandered too far from the True God and somehow got perverted.
-- Derek Swannson, Crash Gordon and the Mysteries of Kingsburg



Origin:
Demiurge meant "a worker for the people" in Ancient Greek, from the roots dḗmio- meaning "of the people" and -ergos , "a worker."

[ITS ME!]

ingeminate \ in-JEM-uh-neyt \ , verb;
1.
To repeat; reiterate.



Quotes:
Sitting among his friends, often, after a deep silence and frequent sighs, he would with a shrill and sad accent ingeminate the word Peace, Peace...
-- Christopher Ricks, Essays in Appreciation

Mr. Dott's spirits were a little dashed, especially as Niven with a fateful countenance continued to ingeminate the word “Hungrygrain.”
-- Arthur Train, Tutt and Mr. Tutt



Origin:
Ingeminate comes from the Latin word ingemināre which meant "to repeat or redouble."

[ITS ME!]

betide \ bih-TAHYD \ , verb;

1.
To happen to; come to; befall.

2.
To happen; come to pass.



Quotes:
"Ill luck betide thee, poor damsel," said Sancho, "ill luck betide thee!"
-- Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote

"The girls' skirts are measured each week with a dressmaker's rule," she would say, "to see that they conform to the length prescribed. Woe betide any girl whose skirt does not."
-- Hilary Mantel, An Experiment in Love



Origin:
Betide stems from the Old English word tide meaning "something that happened." As in besot and belabor , the prefix be- turns the noun into a verb.

[ITS ME!]

apoplectic \ ap-uh-plek-tik \ , adjective;
1.
Intense enough to threaten or cause a stroke.

2.
Of or pertaining to apoplexy.

3.
Having or inclined to apoplexy.

noun: 1.
A person having or predisposed to apoplexy.



Quotes:
When Abie used to shout, Rebecca always used to make a joke that he was having one of his apoplectic fits.
-- Alan Grayson, Mile End

...four years, one recession and a host of battles — over financial regulation and the nomination of Elizabeth Warren, over Dodd-Frank and the Buffett Rule — have taken their toll. Some on Wall Street are apoplectic . One former supporter, Dan Loeb, compared Obama to Nero; the president’s enemies insinuated worse.
-- Nicholas Confessore, "Obama’s Not-So-Hot Date With Wall Street", The New York Times Magazine , May 2, 2012



Origin:
Apoplectic stems from the Greek word apoplēktikós which meant "pertaining to stroke". It literally meant "struck down".

[ITS ME!]

larrup \ LAR-uhp \ , verb;
1.
To beat or thrash.



Quotes:
When a seagoing canoe beached on the stones, or when a neighbor came larruping from around back of the house, Martha Obenchain, peeling potatoes at a table in the sun, rose and put the kettle on, tickled pink.
-- Annie Dillard, The Living

A fast white boat comes larruping around the point from the direction of Mercer Island and banks towards him.
-- Neal Stephenson, Cryptonomicon



Origin:
Larrup may derive from the Dutch word larpen meaning "to beat with flails".

[ITS ME!]

natch \ nach \ , adverb;

1.
Of course; naturally.



Quotes:
She was even more delighted to hear that you were planning to invest in her health club, and hopes to see you there as a patron as well as an investor. At reduced rates, natch ?
-- Evelyn E. Smith, Miss Melville Returns

Yes, well, your father, who has no humanitarian instincts, is already designing a computer program to put the Lever process on automatic. For a small fee, natch .
-- Dana Stabenow, Second Star



Origin:
Natch is a shortening and respelling of the common English word naturally .

[ITS ME!]

divulse \ dahy-VUHLS \ , verb;

1.
To tear away or apart.



Quotes:
A perforation having been so made, it is safer to divulse the opening rather than to enlarge it by cutting in order to avoid the possibility of opening a blood vessel in an inaccessible region.
-- Eugene Fuller, M.D., The Journal of the American Medical Association

Even if you are the kooper of the winkel over measure never lost a license. Nor a duckindonche divulse from bath and breakfast.
-- James Joyce, Finnegans Wake



Origin:
Divulse comes from the Latin root vellere meaning "plucked". The prefix di- is a variation of dis- before the letter v meaning "apart" or "away", as in disown .

[ITS ME!]

pochismo \ poh-CHEEZ-moh \ , noun;
1.
An English word or expression borrowed into Spanish.

2.
A form of speech employing many such words.

3.
An adopted U.S. custom, attitude, etc.




Quotes:
Along the Texas border, in the towns on both sides of the Rio Grande, they call a similar blending of languages pochismo.
-- Robert Wilder, Plough the Sea

The assimilation of English with Spanish speech and of Hispanic with Anglo traits in the mixed culture termed pochismo has brought contrasting values and characteristics into play within families and even within individuals.
-- Milo Kearney and Manuel Medrano, Medieval Culture and the Mexican American Borderlands



Origin:
Pochismo entered English in the 1940s. It is a variation of the word pocho which refers to a person of Mexican heritage who has adopted American customs. The suffix -ismo is usually the Spanish equivalent of the English suffix -ism .

[ITS ME!]

mignon \ min-YON \ , adjective;
1.
Small and pretty; delicately pretty.



Quotes:
And here Jasmin caressed his own arm, and made as if it were a baby's, smiling and speaking in a mignon voice, wagging his head roguishly.
-- William Chambers and Robert Chambers, Chambers's Edinburgh Journal

As the village princeling and household cosset, the toast of the family, the mignon of the minions, the darling of the staff, my feelings about the proposed adoption would not be hard to divine.
-- Martin Amis, Success



Origin:
Mignon stems from the French word of the same spelling which means "delicate" or "charming". It is also related to the word "minion" through the sense of "small".

[ITS ME!]

ravelment \ RAV-uhl-muhnt \ , noun;
1.
Entanglement; confusion.



Quotes:
Hampered as I was by my well-known connection with the Gillespie poisoning case, I could not personally make a move towards the ravelment of its mystery without subjecting myself to the curiosity of the people among whom my attention of the District Attorney's office and the suspicion of the men whose business I was in a measure attempting to usurp.
-- Anna Katharine Green, One of My Sons

What I could see clearly, though, was the lower course of the burn: this bisected the small valley and appeared to loop around the far side of the dwelling, partly enfolding it before it broadened out and spread thence through arable to a ravelment of stone and incoming sea.
-- Clifford Geddes, Edge of the Glen



Origin:
Ravelment derives from the word ravel which means "to become tangled". It entered English in the early 1800s.

[ITS ME!]

fantast \ FAN-tast \ , noun;
1.
A visionary or dreamer.



Quotes:
I wouldn't allow the unwashed fantast in my house, but, I have to remind myself, it isn't my house he is being admitted to.
-- Wallace Earle Stegner, All the Little Live Things

The floor of the shop had been sprinkled with water; it had probably been sprinkled by a great fantast and freethinker, because it was all covered with patterns and cabbalistic signs.
-- Anton Pavlovich Chekhov, The Steppe



Origin:
Fantast entered English from German, though it is based on the Greek word phantastḗs which meant "boaster". It is related to the other English word fantastic .

[ITS ME!]

mewl \ myool \ , verb;
1.
To cry, as a baby, young child, or the like; whimper.



Quotes:
When Celia was growing up, her father had taken in a stray kitten, an avid hunter who – by the time Celia had left for college – still had not gotten over a formative, stray-life trauma that compelled it to mewl between mouthfuls of food.
-- Myla Goldberg, The False Friend

They have mouths that twitch, and eyes that stare, and they babble and they mewl and they whimper.
-- Neil Gaiman, Smoke and Mirrors




Origin:

Mewl is an imitative word that mimics the sound of a whimper.

[ITS ME!]

imponderable \ im-PON-der-uh-buhl \ , noun;

1.
A thing that cannot be precisely determined or measured.

adjective: 1.
Not ponderable; that cannot be precisely determined, measured, or evaluated.



Quotes:
Of course he had always been a huge imponderable , if not to say the biggest challenge of her admittedly young life.
-- Lindsay Armstrong, The Constantin Marriage

Of course there's always the imponderable , the unpredictable which can't be foreseen...
-- Leonardo Sciascia, Peter Robb and Sacha Rabinovitch, The Moro Affair



Origin:
Imponderable comes directly from the Medieval Latin word imponderābilis which had the same meaning.

[ITS ME!]

cunctation \ kuhngk-TEY-shuhn \ , noun;
1.
Delay; tardiness.



Quotes:
Lord Eldon however was personally answerable for unnecessary and culpable cunctation , as he called it in protracting the arguments of counsel, and in deferring judgment from day to day, from term to term, and from year to year after the arguments had closed and he had irrevocably decided in his own mind what the judgment should be.
-- Baron John Campbell, Lives of Lord Lyndhurst and Lord Brougham

"What it's about," Goldman said, with tantalizing cunctation , "is a whole lot of things, as a matter of fact."
-- Philip Kerr, The Shot



Origin:
Cunctation stems from the Latin word cunctātiōn- meaning "delay" or "hesitation".

[ITS ME!]

volant \ VOH-luhnt \ , adjective;

1.
Moving lightly; nimble.

2.
Engaged in or having the power of flight.

noun: 1.
Also called volant piece. Armor. A reinforcing piece for the brow of a helmet.



Quotes:
But here in the present case, to carry on the volant metaphor, (for I must either be merry or mad) is a pretty little Miss, just, come out of her hanging-sleeve coat, brought to buy a pretty little fairing; for the world, Jack, is but a great fair thou knowest; and, to give thee serious reflection for serious, all its toys but tinselled hobby horses, gilt gingerbread, squeaking trumpets, painted drums, and so forth.
-- Samuel Richardson, Clarissa, Or, The History of a Young Lady

With Rube winging it that spring, the band blared, and the volant baseball team was unbeatable.
-- Alan Howard Levy, Rube Waddell



Origin:
Volant stems from the Latin word volāre which meant "to fly". In English, it acquired the sense of moving nimbly in the early 1600s.

[ITS ME!]

pensée \ pahn-SEY \ , noun;

1.
A reflection or thought.



Quotes:
He rose from his deep chair and at his desk entered on the first page of a new notebook a pensee : The penalty of sloth is longevity.
-- Evelyn Waugh, Unconditional Surrender

In a pensee that could have been cribbed from Mae West's daybook, she also said, “If you want to sacrifice the admiration of many men for the criticism of one, go ahead, get married!”
-- Karen Karbo, How to Hepburn



Origin:
Pensée comes directly from the French word of the same spelling which means "a thought".

[ITS ME!]

noctilucent \ nok-tuh-LOO-suhnt \ , adjective;

1.
Visible during the short night of the summer.



Quotes:
So Sax would sit on the Western sea cliff, rapt through the setting of the sun, then stay through the hour of twilight, watching the sky colors change as the sun's shadow rose up, until all the sky was black; and then sometimes there would appear noctilucent clouds, thirty kilometers above the planet, broad streaks gleaming like abalone shells.
-- Kim Stanley Robinson, Blue Mars

The shells of 155-mm howitzers whistled away through the dark air, orange flashes popped like noctilucent flowers on the western ridge of Hon Heo Mountain and disappeared shortly after, and then the sound of explosions rumbled through the ground.
-- Junghyo Ahn, White Badge



Origin:
Noctilucent entered English in the late 1800s. It is a combination of the prefix nocti- (which means "night") and lucent (which means "shining").

[ITS ME!]

enchiridion \ en-kahy-RID-ee-uhn \ , noun;
1.
A handbook; manual.



Quotes:
For you offer us the postulation that we can, in the shadow, or rather the radiance, of your own enchiridion , go and do likewise.
-- Marcel Proust, Swann's Way

Sarah and Isaac were romping noisily about and under the beds; Rachel was at the table, knitting a scarf for Solomon; grandmother pored over a bulky enchiridion for pious women, written in jargon.
-- Israel Zangwill, Children of the Ghetto



Origin:
Enchiridion stems from the Greek root cheir meaning "hand". The prefix en- means "within", so the noun means "in the hand". The suffix -idion denotes a diminutive form of another word.

[ITS ME!]

subitize \ SOO-bi-tahyz \ , verb;
1.
To perceive at a glance the number of items presented.



Quotes:
Below seven the subjects were said to subitize ; above seven they were said to estimate.
-- H. Gutfreund and G. Toulouse, Biology and Computation: A Physicist's Choice

I wanted to see if Pedro could subitize , so I asked, “Pedro, how many stars are in the first circle?”
-- Melissa Conklin, It Makes Sense!



Origin:
Subitize comes from the Latin word subitāre which meant "to appear suddenly".