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Post by Deleted on Aug 17, 2004 13:19:54 GMT -5
The Word of the Day for August 17 is:
tartar \TAR-ter\ noun 1 capitalized : a native or inhabitant of a vast historical region in Asia and Eastern Europe roughly extending from the Sea of Japan to the Dnieper *2 often capitalized : a person of irritable or violent temper 3 : one that proves to be unexpectedly formidable
Example sentence: On the basketball court, Nate was a Tartar whose undisciplined behavior often got him in trouble with the referee.
Did you know? Originally, their name was "Tatar," not "Tartar." Since at least the 1200s, the Tatar people have lived in Asia and Eastern Europe, and they were among the fiercest fighters of the Golden Horde of the Mongols. In the 13th century, they rode with Genghis Khan and became the terror of their day. Their name, "Tatar," is believed to come from Persian or a Turkic language, but in Europe it was associated with "Tartarus," the Latin name for the part of Hell reserved for the punishment of the wicked. Because of that association, English speakers began calling the Tatar people "Tartars." Over time, "tartar" came to be used for anyone considered as ferocious or violent as the Tartar warriors who had once ransacked the ancient world.
*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence
And they made a mean sauce for their roast beast.
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Post by IdahoBoy on Aug 17, 2004 21:35:09 GMT -5
The Word of the Day for August 17 is: tartar This reminds me of the Huns in one of my favorite all-time video games: the Age of Conquerors II: The Conquerors. They have a special military unit called "tartars" who have especially high speed and attack power vs. buildings. www.microsoft.com/Games/conquerors/civilizations.asp?f1=no&f2=huns
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Post by Deleted on Aug 18, 2004 9:14:20 GMT -5
The Word of the Day for August 18 is:
liminal \LIM-uh-nul\ adjective 1 : of or relating to a sensory threshold *2 : barely perceptible 3 : of, relating to, or being an intermediate state, phase, or condition : in-between, transitional
Example sentence: In the background of the painting, a liminal figure stands in the murky half-light.
Did you know? "Liminal" descends from the Latin noun "limen," meaning "threshold." It makes sense, then, that "liminal" applies to the idea of a sensory threshold, the point at which a physiological effect begins to be produced. Likewise, closely related "subliminal" means "below a threshold"; it can describe something inadequate to produce a sensation or something operating below a threshold of consciousness. The "sensory threshold" sense of "liminal" has given rise to extended uses. In addition to the "barely perceptible" sense, "liminal" now sometimes means "transitional" or "intermediate" (as in "the liminal zone between sleep and wakefulness").
*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 19, 2004 8:35:25 GMT -5
The Word of the Day for August 19 is:
bruit \BROOT\ verb : report, rumor -- usually used with "about"
Example sentence: The number of rescues by monks [of the Hospice of the Great St. Bernard] and their dogs is anyone's guess. The figure of 2,500 is bruited about. . . ." (Deborah Lawson, _Dog Fancy_, Sept. 1991)
Did you know? Back in the days of Middle English, the Anglo-French noun "bruit," meaning "clamor" or "noise," rattled into English. Soon English speakers were also using it to mean "report" or "rumor." (It applied especially to favorable reports.) We also began using "bruit" as a verb the way we used (and still occasionally do use) the verb "noise," with the meaning "to spread by rumor or report" (as in "the scandal was quickly noised about"). The English noun "bruit" is now considered archaic, but the verb lives on. Although "bruit" doesn't have a lot of close English relatives, it's a distant cousin of "bray."
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 20, 2004 11:20:55 GMT -5
The Word of the Day for August 20 is:
white elephant \WYTE-EL-uh-funt\ noun *1 : a property requiring much care and expense and yielding little profit 2 : an object no longer of value to its owner but of value to others 3 : something of little or no value
Example sentence: The town's white elephant is the closed theater, which earns no money but costs thousands of dollars to maintain.
Did you know? The real "white elephant" (the kind with a trunk) is a pale pachyderm that has long been an object of veneration in India, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Myanmar. Too revered to be a beast of burden, the white elephant earned a reputation as a burdensome beast, one that required constant care and feeding but never brought a single cent (or paisa or satang or pya) to its owner. One story has it that the kings of Siam (the old name for Thailand) gave white elephants as gifts to those they wished to ruin, hoping that the cost of maintaining the voracious but sacred mammal would drive its new owner to the poorhouse.
*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.
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J.S. Bach
Sophomore
I'll hug your Elephant. You kiss my ass.
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Post by J.S. Bach on Aug 20, 2004 13:11:54 GMT -5
Would somebody remind me which well-known Party has an white (starred) elephant as their mascot...? Fitting.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 23, 2004 0:21:15 GMT -5
The Word of the Day for August 21 is:
precocial \prih-KOH-shul\ adjective : capable of a high degree of independent activity from birth
Example sentence: The precocial offspring of many ducks can run, swim, and find food for themselves within 36 hours of hatching.
Did you know? "Precocial" and its partner "altricial" are really for the birds. Well, at least they are often used to describe the young of our feathered friends. The chicks of precocial birds can see as soon as they hatch and generally have strong legs and a body covered with fine down. Those are attributes you would expect in birds described by the word "precocial," which traces to the Latin "praecox," a term that means "precocious" or "early ripening" (yes, that root also gave us the word "precocious"). Ducks, geese, ostriches, pheasants, and quail are among the birds that hatch precocial offspring. Altricial chicks, on the other hand, are basically featherless and helpless at birth and require days or weeks of parental care before becoming independent.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 23, 2004 0:25:02 GMT -5
The Word of the Day for August 22 is:
dudgeon \DUH-jun\ noun : a fit or state of indignation
Example sentence: The assistant cook stormed out of the kitchen in high dudgeon after being lambasted -- unjustifiably, in his opinion -- by the head chef.
Did you know? "Dudgeon" is today most often used in the phrase "in high dudgeon" (which in turn sometimes gives rise to playful variations such as "middling dudgeon," "intermediate dudgeon," "towering dudgeon," "lofty dudgeon," and so on). It's a mystery where the expression came from, however. (Conjectures as to a connection to a Welsh word, "dygen," meaning "malice," have no basis.) There does not appear to be any connection whatever to the very old "dudgeon" -- a now obsolete term once used for a dagger or a kind of wood out of which dagger handles were made. But since at least 1573 curmudgeons and others have expressed their indignation with "dudgeon."
Many a dudgeon in this Forum.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 23, 2004 8:31:42 GMT -5
The Word of the Day for August 23 is:
hallmark \HAWL-mark\ noun 1 : a mark or device placed or stamped on an article of trade to indicate origin, purity, or genuineness *2 : a distinguishing characteristic, trait, or feature
Example sentence: Even when he was in Little League, it was clear that Dave had all the hallmarks of a great baseball player.
Did you know? Centuries ago, King Edward I of England decreed that gold and silver had to be tested and approved by master craftsmen before being sold. Later, London artisans were required to bring finished metal goods to Goldsmith's Hall to be checked, and if those items met the quality standards of the craft-masters there, they would be marked with a special stamp of approval. (The process is much the same today.) At first, people used "hallmark" to name that mark of excellence from Goldsmith's Hall, but over the years the word came to refer to any mark guaranteeing purity or genuineness, and eventually to name any sign of outstanding talent, creativity, or excellence.
*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 24, 2004 8:54:53 GMT -5
The Word of the Day for August 24 is:
stolid \STAH-lid\ adjective : having or expressing little or no sensibility : unemotional
Example sentence: The judge was a man of stolid temperament who did not let the impassioned rhetoric of litigants affect his decisions.
Did you know? "Stolid" derives from "stolidus," a word that means "dull" or "stupid" in Latin. It is also distantly related to the word "stultify," meaning "to cause to appear or be stupid, foolish, or absurdly illogical." The earliest examples of usage for "stolid," dating back to the 17th century, indicate that it too was originally associated with a lack of smarts; it was used to describe people who were considered dull or stupid because they didn't wear their emotions on their sleeves. By the 1800s, however, "stolid" was frequently appearing without the connotation of foolishness, and it continues to be free of such overtones today.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 25, 2004 9:23:33 GMT -5
The Word of the Day for August 25 is:
nabob \NAY-bahb\ noun 1 : a provincial governor of the Mogul empire in India *2 : a person of great wealth or prominence
Example sentence: "It's the haunt of international luminaries . . . television pundits, industrial nabobs, visiting royals, best- selling novelists, and anybody who is anybody." (Jay Jacobs, _Gourmet_, January 1983)
Did you know? In India's Mogul Empire, founded by the Moslem prince Babur in the 16th century, provincial governors carried the title of "nawab" in the Urdu language. In 1612, Captain Robert Coverte (apparently unaware of earlier travel accounts) published a report of his "discovery" of "the Great Mogoll, a prince not till now knowne to our English nation." The Captain informed the English-speaking world that "An earle is called a Nawbob," thereby introducing the English version of the word to the written page. "Nabob," as it thereafter came to be spelled, gained its extended sense of "a prominent person" in the late 18th century, when it was applied sarcastically to British officials of the East India Company who returned home after amassing great wealth trading in Asia.
*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 31, 2004 9:17:13 GMT -5
The Word of the Day for August 27 is:
mea culpa \may-uh-KOOL-puh (the "OO" is as in "wool")\ noun : a formal acknowledgment of personal fault or error
Example sentence: The principal offered his mea culpa at the school board meeting, but not all the parents accepted it.
Did you know? "Mea culpa," which means "through my fault" in Latin, comes from a prayer of confession in the Catholic church. Said by itself, it's an exclamation of apology or remorse that is used to mean "It was my fault" or "I apologize." "Mea culpa" is also a noun, however. A newspaper might issue a mea culpa for printing inaccurate information, or a politician might give a speech making mea culpas for past wrongdoings. "Mea culpa" is one of many English terms that derive from the Latin "culpa," meaning "guilt." Some other examples are "culpable" ("meriting condemnation or blame especially as wrong or harmful") and "culprit" ("one guilty of a crime or a fault").
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Post by Deleted on Aug 31, 2004 9:22:31 GMT -5
The Word of the Day for August 28 is:
vapid \VAP-id\ adjective : lacking liveliness, tang, briskness, or force : flat, dull
Example sentence: The movie was billed as a gripping summer blockbuster but turned out to be a vapid effort with a slow pace and a poorly written script.
Did you know? "Then away goes the brisk and pleasant Spirits and leave a vapid or sour Drink." So wrote John Mortimer, an early 18th- century expert on agriculture, orchards, and cider-making, in his book on husbandry. His use was typical for his day, when "vapid" was often used specifically in reference to liquor. The term, which entered English in the 17th century, comes from "vapidus," a Latin word that means "flat-tasting" and may be related to "vapor." These days, you're likely to hear people referring to wine as "vapid." You're likely to hear the word in plenty of other situations, too. "Vapid," along with the synonyms "insipid," "flat," and "inane," is often used to describe people and things that lack spirit and character.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 31, 2004 9:23:56 GMT -5
The Word of the Day for August 29 is:
aspersion \uh-SPER-zhun\ noun 1 : a sprinkling with water especially in religious ceremonies 2 *a : a false or misleading charge meant to harm someone's reputation b : the act of making such a charge : defamation
Example sentence: "I defy all the world to cast a just aspersion on my character: nay, the most scandalous tongues have never dared censure my reputation." (Henry Fielding, _Tom Jones_)
Did you know? "No sweet aspersion shall the heavens let fall / To make this contract grow." In this line from Shakespeare's _The Tempest_, "aspersion" literally refers to a sprinkling of rain, but figuratively means "blessing." Shakespeare's use is true to the heritage of the term. "Aspersion" comes from the Latin word "aspersus," itself a derivative of the verb "aspergere," which means "to sprinkle" or "to scatter." When "aspersion" first appeared in English in the 16th century, it referred to the type of sprinklings (for instance, of holy water) that occur in religious ceremonies. But English speakers noted that splatterings can soil and stain, and by 1596 "aspersion" was also being used for reports that stain or tarnish a reputation.
*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Aug 31, 2004 9:43:20 GMT -5
The Word of the Day for August 31 is:
Occident \AKH-suh-dunt\ noun : regions or countries lying to the west of a specified or implied point of orientation
Example sentence: "Not only are we in the Occident girding ourselves for recession, but... [the] economies are showing signs of deflation, too." (Kevin Libin, _Canadian Business_, December 10, 2001)
Did you know? You may not be reflecting on the history of the word "Occident" as you watch a beautiful sunset, but there is a connection. "Occident," which comes from Latin "occidere," meaning "to fall," once referred to the part of the sky in which the sun goes down. Geoffrey Chaucer used the word in that now obsolete sense around 1386, and shortly thereafter, the word took on the "western regions and countries" sense that we still use. Exactly what is meant by "western" is not always the same. Originally, "Occident" referred to western Europe or the Western Roman Empire. In modern times, it usually refers to some portion of Europe and North America as distinct from Asia. The opposite of "Occident" is "Orient," which comes from Latin "oriri" ("to rise").
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