Cuvantul zilei - Word of the day

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 29, 2010 is:

adjure • \uh-JOOR\  • verb
1 : to command solemnly under or as if under oath or penalty of a curse *2 : to urge or advise earnestly

Example sentence:
"Byron fled the country, adjuring Annabella to 'be kind' to his beloved sister." (Merle Rubin, Los Angeles Times, September 16, 2002)

Did you know?
"Adjure" and its synonyms "entreat," "importune," and "implore" all mean "to ask earnestly." "Entreat" implies an effort to persuade or overcome resistance. "Importune" goes further, adding a sense of annoying persistence in trying to break down resistance to a request. "Implore," on the other hand, suggests a great urgency or anguished appeal on the part of the speaker. "Adjure" implies advising as well as pleading, and is sometimes accompanied by the invocation of something sacred. Be careful not to confuse "adjure" with "abjure," meaning "to renounce solemnly" or "to abstain from." Both words are rooted in Latin "jurare," meaning "to swear," but "adjure" includes the prefix "ad-," meaning "to" or "toward," whereas "abjure" draws on "ab-," meaning "from" or "away."

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 28, 2010 is:

friable • \FRYE-uh-bul\  • adjective
: easily crumbled or pulverized

Example sentence:
These plants will grow best in a soft, friable soil.

Did you know?
"Friable" entered into English in the mid-1500s, and was borrowed either from Middle French or directly from Latin "friabilis." This Latin adjective comes from the verb "friare," which means "to crumble." "Fiare" in turn is related to the verb "fricare" ("to rub"), the source of the English noun "friction." "Friable" is used to describe something that can be easily reduced to a powdered form. In contemporary usage, it is often found in the discussion of asbestos. Health concerns about asbestos primarily center around friable asbestos -- that is, asbestos that is easily pulverized into tiny fibers which may remain suspended in the air and become a potential health risk to those who inhale them.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 27, 2010 is:

Hobson's choice • \HAHB-sunz-choyss\  • noun
*1 : an apparently free choice when there is no real alternative 2 : the necessity of accepting one of two or more equally objectionable alternatives

Example sentence:
Reportedly, Model T manufacturer Henry Ford once gave this Hobson's choice: "Any customer can have a car painted any color that he wants so long as it is black."

Did you know?
In the late 16th and early 17th centuries, Thomas Hobson worked as a licensed carrier of passengers, letters, and parcels between Cambridge and London, England. He kept horses for this purpose and rented them to university students when he wasn't using them. Of course, the students always wanted their favorite mounts, and consequently a few of Hobson's horses became overworked. To correct the situation, Hobson began a strict rotation system, giving each customer the choice of taking the horse nearest the stable door or none at all. This rule became known as "Hobson's choice," and soon people were using that term to mean "no choice at all" in all kinds of situations.

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 26, 2010 is:

parlay • \PAHR-lay\  • verb
1 : to bet in a parlay 2 a : to exploit successfully* b : to increase or otherwise transform into something of much greater value

Example sentence:
The young actor parlayed his popularity as a teen heartthrob into a successful film career.

Did you know?
If you're the gambling type, you may already know that "parlay" can also be used as a noun describing a series of bets in which a person places a bet, then puts the original stake of money and all of its winnings on new wagers. But you might not know that "parlay" represents a modified spelling of the French name for such bets: "paroli." You might also be unaware that the original French word is still occasionally used in English with the same meaning as the noun "parlay."

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 25, 2010 is:

poetaster • \POH-uh-tass-ter\  • noun
: an inferior poet

Example sentence:
"Germaine Greer, Chair Of Judges For The National Poetry Competition 2000, Invites Entries From Readers, But Be Warned: Poetasters Need Not Apply" (Headline, The [London] Independent, May 7, 2000)

Did you know?
In Latin, the suffix "-aster" indicates partial resemblance. In both Latin and English, that often translates to "second-rate," or maybe even "third-rate." Not surprisingly, "poetaster" often goes hand in hand with "doggerel," meaning "verse marked by triviality or inferiority." "Most of the people who send me thick sheaves of handwritten or word-processed doggerel," Ms. Greer tells us in the Independent article we quote above, "appear never to have read any poetry, good or bad.... Every week poetasters, like literary flashers seeking to amaze and appal hapless passers-by with the sight of their grey flaccidities, send their effusions to people like me." Are there are other kinds of "-asters" out there? Yes indeed -- we have criticasters, philosophasters, and politicasters, among others.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 24, 2010 is:

tactile • \TAK-tul\  • adjective
1 : perceptible by touch *2 : of, relating to, or being the sense of touch

Example sentence:
"Nothing prepared me for the tactile reality of the original volumes, leaf after carefully written leaf over which his hand had travelled...." (Edmund Morris, The New Yorker, January 16, 1995)

Did you know?
"Tangible" is related to "tactile," and so are "intact," "tact," "contingent," "tangent," and even "entire." There's also the uncommon noun "taction," meaning "the act of touching." Like "tactile," all of these words can be traced back to the Latin verb "tangere," meaning "to touch." "Tactile" made its way to our language by way of French, touching ground in English in the early 17th century.

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 23, 2010 is:

garner • \GAHR-ner\  • verb
1 a : to gather into storage b : to deposit as if in a granary 2 *a : to acquire by effort : earn b : accumulate, collect

Example sentence:
Through hard work and a determination to see her students succeed, Ms. Taylor has garnered considerable respect from parents and her fellow teachers.

Did you know?
What do you call a building in which grain is stored? These days, English speakers are most likely to call it a "granary," but there was a time when the noun "garner" was also a likely candidate. That noun, which can also mean "something that is collected," dates from the 12th century. The verb "garner" joined the language two centuries later. The verb was once commonly used with the meaning "to gather into a granary," but today it usually means "to earn" or "to accumulate." The noun "garner" is uncommon in contemporary use; it is now found mainly in older literary contexts, such as these lines of verse from Sir Walter Scott's "The Bride of Lammermoor": "Or, from the garner-door, on ether borne, / The chaff flies devious from the winnow'd corn."

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 22, 2010 is:

inenarrable • \in-ih-NAIR-uh-bul\  • adjective
: incapable of being narrated : indescribable

Example sentence:
"Their songs were sometimes frenzied like the dances in which they whirled to syncopated rhythms, but more often muffled and sad with the inenarrable misery of their bondage." (Ross Lockridge, Jr., Raintree County)

Did you know?
"Ineffable," "inenarrable," "indescribable" -- English has quite a few words for expressing that which can't be expressed. The prefix "in-," meaning "not," teamed up with Latin "enarrare" ("to explain in detail") to give us "inenarrable," and the same prefix joined with Latin "effabilis" ("capable of being expressed") to create "ineffable." English speakers have used "ineffable" since the 14th century, and "inenarrable" made its way into the language from French in the 15th century. "Indescribable" was a late arrival, relatively speaking -- it has only been with us since the 18th century.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 21, 2010 is:

declivity • \di-KLIV-uh-tee\  • noun
1 : downward inclination *2 : a descending slope

Example sentence:
The hikers cautiously made their way down the somewhat steep and rocky declivity that led to the river.

Did you know?
Three different English words descend from "clivus," the Latin word for "slope" or "hill" -- with the help of three Latin prefixes. "Declivity" combines "clivus" with the prefix "de-," meaning "down" or "away." "Acclivity" uses "ad-" (which may change its second letter depending on the root word), meaning "to" or "toward." Hence, an acclivity is an upward slope. The third word has a figurative meaning in English: "proclivity" makes use of the prefix "pro-," meaning "forward," and this word refers to a personal inclination, predisposition, or "leaning."

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 20, 2010 is:

conn • \KAHN\  • verb
: to conduct or direct the steering of (as a ship)

Example sentence:
The captain successfully conned his ship through the ice-packed waters.

Did you know?
In the 19th century, warships (and, later, submarines) began to be built with structures known as "conning towers." These structures were so called because it was from them that an officer could "conn" the vessel. The verb "conn" (also spelled "con") is first known to have appeared in English in the 1600s. It is an alteration of "cond," which is probably an alteration of Middle English "condien" or "conduen," meaning "to conduct." Since the 19th century, "conn" has also been used as a noun ("the control exercised by one who conducts or directs the steering of a ship"). This noun, though seldom encountered in general English, is likely familiar to fans of the various Star Trek series in which the directive "You have the conn" is sometimes given from the starship captain to another officer on the bridge.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 19, 2010 is:

Barmecidal • \bahr-muh-SYE-dul\  • adjective
: providing only the illusion of abundance

Example sentence:
The tax rebate is a Barmecidal windfall, coming as it does in the wake of new hidden taxes on consumer goods and services.

Did you know?
"Barmecide" is the name of a family of princes in a tale from The Thousand and One Nights (also known as The Arabian Nights' Entertainment). One prince in the family torments a beggar by inviting him to a fabulous feast, at which all the dishes are imaginary. The poor man plays along with his malicious host, pretending to get drunk on the imaginary wine; he then gets even by knocking down the patronizing royal.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 18, 2010 is:

agita • \AJ-uh-tuh\  • noun
: a feeling of agitation or anxiety

Example sentence:
"Bank nationalization would drive the stock market down and increase the agita of people with 401(k) plans." (Nicholas Lemann, New Yorker, April 6, 2009)

Did you know?
Judging by its spelling and meaning, you might think that "agita" is simply a shortened version of "agitation," but that's not the case. Both "agitation" and the verb "agitate" derive from Latin "agere" ("to drive"). "Agita," which first appeared in American English in the early 1980s, comes from a dialectical pronunciation of the Italian word "acido," meaning "heartburn" or "acid," from Latin "acidus." ("Agita" is also occasionally used in English with the meaning "heartburn.") For a while the word's usage was limited to New York City and surrounding regions, but the word became more widespread in the mid-90s.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 17, 2010 is:

burgle • \BER-gul\  • verb
*1 : to break into and steal from 2 : to commit burglary against

Example sentence:
Mike was aghast upon returning home to discover that someone had burgled his house while he was away.

Did you know?
"Burglary," which means "forcible entry into a building especially at night with the intent to commit a crime (as theft)," and "burglar" ("one who commits burglary") have been with us since the 16th century. "Burgle" and its synonym "burglarize" didn't break into the language until the 19th century, however, arriving almost simultaneously around 1870. "Burgle" is a back-formation (that is, a word formed by removing a suffix or prefix) from "burglar." "Burglarize" comes from "burglar" as well, with the addition of the familiar "-ize" ending. Both verbs were once disparaged by grammarians ("burgle" was considered to be "facetious" and "burglarize" was labeled "colloquial"), but they are now generally accepted. "Burglarize" is slightly more common in American English, whereas "burgle" seems to be preferred in British English.

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 16, 2010 is:

bandbox • \BAND-bahks\  • noun
1 : a usually cylindrical box of cardboard or thin wood for holding light articles of attire *2 : a structure (as a baseball park) having relatively small interior dimensions

Example sentence:
"Baseballs flew out of there at a record pace for a while, and everyone had theories about why this stadium was behaving like a bandbox, despite similar dimensions to the old place." (Filip Bondy, Daily News [New York], November 8, 2009)

Did you know?
In the 17th century, the word "band" was sometimes used for ruffs, the large round collars of pleated muslin or linen worn by men and women of the time period, and the bandbox was invented for holding such bands. The flimsy cardboard structure of the box inspired people to start using its name for any flimsy object, especially a small and insubstantial one. But people also contemplated the neat, sharp appearance of ruffs just taken from a bandbox and began using the word in a complimentary way in phrases such as "she looked as if she came out of a bandbox." Today, "bandbox" can also be used as an adjective meaning "exquisitely neat, clean, or ordered," as in "bandbox military officers."

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 15, 2010 is:

ab initio • \ab-ih-NISH-ee-oh\  • adverb
: from the beginning

Example sentence:
"What does not exist ab initio is wealth; wealth must be created by sustained human effort." (Richmond Times Dispatch [Virginia], December 14, 2008)

Did you know?
We’ll tell you right from the beginning where "ab initio" comes from. This adverb was adopted at the end of the 16th century directly from Latin, and it translates, unsurprisingly, as "from the beginning." ("Initio" is a form of the noun "initium," meaning "beginning," which gave rise to such English words as "initial," "initiate," and "initiative.") "Ab initio" most frequently appears in legal contexts, but our example sentence is not out of the norm. Recently, people have also begun using "ab initio" as an adjective meaning "starting from or based on first principles" (as in "predicted from ab initio calculations").

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 14, 2010 is:

prolegomenon • \proh-lih-GAH-muh-nahn\  • noun
: prefatory remarks; specifically : a formal essay or critical discussion serving to introduce and interpret an extended work

Example sentence:
The book is introduced by a lengthy prolegomenon, which is followed by 17 chapters of analysis.

Did you know?
"Prolegomenon" is the singular and "prolegomena" is the plural of this scholarly word, though people sometimes mistakenly interpret "prolegomena" as the singular. The word, which comes from the Greek verb "prolegein" ("to say beforehand"), first appeared in print around 1652. It has appeared in the titles of noteworthy scholarly and philosophical works, but it has never been as common in general use as its older cousin "prologue." "Prologue" usually refers to an introduction to a literary work or to a speech addressed to the audience at the beginning of a play. "Prolegomenon" is most often used of the introduction to a work of scholarly analysis. Both words can also be used in a broader sense to refer generally to something that serves as an introduction.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 13, 2010 is:

autochthonous • \aw-TAHK-thuh-nus\  • adjective
1 : indigenous, native *2 : formed or originating in the place where found

Example sentence:
"People tend to admire cultural forms that seem autochthonous, sprung from their native soil." (Stephen Greenblatt, Los Angeles Times, April 17, 2005)

Did you know?
Ancient Athenians considered their ancestors the primordial inhabitants of their land, as if sprung from the very soil of the region they inhabited. Their word for any true-born Athenian, "autochthōn," itself springs from "auto-," meaning "self," and "chthōn," meaning "earth." Nowadays, the English adjective "autochthonous" is often used in somewhat meaty scientific or anthropological writing (as in "several autochthonous cases of fever broke out in the region"), but it was a "bready" context in which it made its debut. Observed English literary critic William Taylor in 1805: "The English have this great predilection for autochthonous bread and butter" (rather than French bread, one might safely presume).

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 12, 2010 is:

stand pat • \STAND-PAT\  • verb
1 : to play one's hand as dealt in draw poker without drawing *2 : to oppose or resist change

Example sentence:
"We cannot afford to stand pat while the world races by." (President Barack Obama, remarks at Carnegie-Mellon University, June 2, 2010)

Did you know?
If you stand pat in draw poker you're betting on the cards in your hand being better than any you're likely to draw. It didn't take long for "stand pat" to move from the poker table, where it first appeared in the late 1800s, to the realm of politics; by the early 20th century, to stand pat was to oppose any change in U.S. tariff policy. The term continues to be used mainly in U.S. English, where it's applied to everything from a coach's decision not to change out players during a game to a homeowner's decision not to refinance. The nouns "standpatter" ("one who resists or opposes change") and "standpattism" ("resistance to change" or "reluctance to take positive action") are also used, although generally only in political contexts.

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 11, 2010 is:

perfidious • \per-FID-ee-us\  • adjective
: of, relating to, or characterized by faithlessness or disloyalty : treacherous

Example sentence:
"Businessmen are constantly scheming to get the government to beat up on their competitors, and the best excuse of all is that the competitor is a perfidious foreigner." (The Wall Street Journal, October 27, 1992)

Did you know?
We wouldn't lie to you about the history of "perfidious" -- even though the word itself suggests deceitfulness. The modern English meaning of "perfidious" remains faithful to that of its Latin ancestor, "perfidus," which means "faithless." English speakers have used "perfidious" to mean "treacherous" since at least 1572. One of the earliest known uses of the term can be found in Act V, scene iii of Shakespeare’s All's Well That Ends Well: the "perfidious slave" Parolles is thought to be an unreliable witness; he’ll say whatever suits his purpose, whether true or not. In contemporary usage, "perfidious" not only implies treacherousness, but an inability to be reliable or honorable.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 10, 2010 is:

sinew • \SIN-yoo\  • noun
1 : tendon; especially : one dressed for use as a cord or thread 2 a : solid resilient strength : power* b : the chief supporting force : mainstay -- usually used in plural

Example sentence:
"For at Trout-hall … there is usually an Angler that proves good company. And let me tell you, good company and good discourse are the very sinews of virtue." (Izaak Walton, The Compleat Angler, 1653)

Did you know?
Many parts of the body have come to have figurative meanings in English. One can have an eye for interior design, for example, or the stomach for a fight. "Muscle," of course, can mean "strength," and so can "sinew," a word for the tissue that ties muscle to bone -- more commonly known as a tendon. (For a while, "sinew" also meant "nerve," but that usage is obsolete.) The use of "sinew" to mean "the chief supporting force" ties into its anatomical function as a stabilizing unit. "Sinew" derives via Middle English from Old English "seono"; it is also related to Old High German "senawa" ("sinew") and Sanskrit "syati" ("he binds").

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 09, 2010 is:

struthious • \STROO-thee-us\  • adjective
: of or relating to the ostriches and related birds

Example sentence:
"The law is not so struthious as to compel a judge … to divorce himself or herself from common sense or to ignore what is perfectly obvious." (Hon. Bruce M. Selya, U.S. v. Sklar, U.S. Court of Appeals, 1st Circuit, 1990)

Did you know?
"Struthious" can be scientific and literal, or it can be figurative with the meaning "ostrich-like," as in our example sentence. The extended use suggests a tendency to bury one’s head in the sand like an ostrich. But do ostriches really do this? No -- the bird’s habit of lying down and flattening its neck and head against the ground to escape detection gave rise to the misconception. The word "struthious" has been fully visible in English since the 18th century. "Ostrich" is much older. Anglo-French speakers created "ostriz" from Vulgar Latin "avis struthio" ("ostrich bird"); Middle English speakers made it "ostrich" in the 13th century. Scientists seeking a genus word for ostriches turned back to Latin, choosing "struthio."

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 08, 2010 is:

congeries • \KAHN-juh-reez\  • noun
: aggregation, collection

Example sentence:
As we walked past the food stalls our nostrils were assailed by a congeries of exotic, unfamiliar smells.

Did you know?
What do "epitome," "circus," "tribunal," and "congeries" have in common? All are part of a relatively small collection of English nouns that made the transition from Latin to English unaltered in both spelling and meaning. "Congeries" joined this group in our language in the early 1600s. Latin "congeries" comes from the Latin verb "congerere," which means "to carry or bring together" and which is also the source of our word "congest." In English, "congeries" stands out because it is a singular word with a plural appearance -- and its plural is also spelled "congeries."

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 07, 2010 is:

infra dig • \IN-fruh-DIG\  • adjective
: being beneath one's dignity : undignified

Example sentence:
"Among artists lithography was infra dig by the 1870's -- because commercial illustrators had discovered it was a perfect printing medium for glaring posters." (D. J. R. Bruckner,  The New York Times, December 20, 1998)

Did you know?
In her autobiography, Eleanor Roosevelt wrote "No one can make you feel inferior without your consent." In other (less eloquent) words, don't put up with any treatment or situation that is unendurably infra dig. The word "infra dig" is used in relatively casual, sometimes sarcastic contexts (e.g., "Apparently, drugstore-purchased shampoo is too infra dig for my glamorous sister -- only the most expensive salon shampoos will do!"). "Infra dig" is a shortened version of the Latin phrase "infra dignitatem," meaning "beneath dignity."

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 06, 2010 is:

peloton • \pel-uh-TAHN\  • noun
: the main body of riders in a bicycle race

Example sentence:
"The first major splits occur in the peloton at about the 110-mile mark, where many riders find they can no longer keep up." (Michael Barry, The New York Times, September 26, 2008)

Did you know?
If you've ever watched the Tour de France on television, you've seen the peloton, the brightly colored pack of riders making up the central group. You may have also gained some inadvertent insight into the word itself, which as you may have guessed is French in origin. In French, "peloton" literally means "ball," but it is most often used with the meaning "group." It's frequently used in the bicycling context, just as in English, but it can also refer to a group in a marathon or other sporting event. French "peloton" can also mean "squad" or "platoon," and since we’ve told you that you probably won’t be too surprised to learn that it is also the source of our word "platoon."

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 05, 2010 is:

ponderous • \PAHN-duh-rus\  • adjective
1 : of very great weight *2 : unwieldy or clumsy because of weight and size 3 : oppressively or unpleasantly dull : lifeless

Example sentence:
"Electronic texts can be updated at the speed of a download rather than waiting for the next edition of a ponderous textbook." (St. Petersburg Times [Florida], June 6, 2010)

Did you know?
"Ponderous" is ultimately from the Latin word for "weight," namely, "pondus" (which also gave us "ponder" and "preponderance" and is related to "pound"). We adopted "ponderous" with the literal sense "heavy" from Anglo-French "ponderus" in the 15th century, and early on we appended a figurative sense of "weighty," that is, "serious" or "important." But we stopped using the "serious" sense of "ponderous" around 200 years ago -- perhaps because in the meantime we'd imposed on it a different figurative sense of "dull and lifeless," which we still use today.

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 04, 2010 is:

cadence • \KAY-dunss\  • noun
*1 : a rhythmic sequence or flow of sounds (as in language) 2 : a musical chord sequence moving to a harmonic close or point of rest 3 : the modulated and rhythmic recurrence of a sound especially in nature

Example sentence:
"She sang, and her voice flowed in a rich cadence, swelling or dying away, like a nightingale of the woods." (Mary Shelley, Frankenstein, 1818)

Did you know?
Falling into the hands of English speakers in the 14th century, "cadence" derives via Middle English and Old Italian from the Latin verb "cadere," meaning "to fall." ("Cadere" can be found in the history of many common English words, including "decay," "coincide," and "accident"). We most often hear "cadence" used in contexts pertaining to voice or music -- it might refer to the familiar way in which someone speaks, or the rhythms employed by a rap artist, or the rising and falling notes of a bird’s call. "Cadenza," the Old Italian word that factors into the history of "cadence," has its own place in English as well, usually referring to a brilliant musical flourish played before closing out an aria.

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 03, 2010 is:

Antaean • \an-TEE-un\  • adjective
1 : mammoth *2 : having superhuman strength

Example sentence:
The movie's climax is a suspenseful fight sequence between the Antaean heroine and her grotesque alien nemesis.

Did you know?
In Greek mythology, Antaeus was the gigantic and powerful son of Gaea the Earth goddess and Poseidon the sea god. Antaeus was a wrestler and whenever he touched his mother (the Earth), his strength was renewed, so he always won his battles even if his opponents threw him to the ground. He proved invincible until he challenged Hercules to wrestle. Hercules discovered the source of the giant's strength, lifted him off the ground, and crushed him to death. In 18th century England, the poet William Mason discovered the power of "Antaean" as a descriptive English adjective, when he used it in his Ode to the Hon. William Pitt: "If foil'd at first, resume thy course / Rise strengthen'd with Antaean force."

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 02, 2010 is:

nescience • \NESH-ee-unss\  • noun
: lack of knowledge or awareness : ignorance

Example sentence:
"[Samuel] Johnson was so vexed by a young clergyman's nescience that he complained, 'His ignorance is so great, I am afraid to show him the bottom of it.'" (Barry Baldwin, Verbatim, June 22, 2003)

Did you know?
Eighteenth-century British poet, essayist, and lexicographer Samuel Johnson once said, "There is nothing so minute or inconsiderable that I would not rather know it than not know it." He probably knew a thing or two about the history of the word "nescience," which evolved from a combination of the Latin prefix "ne-," meaning "not," and "scire," a verb meaning "to know." And he may also have known that "scire" is an ancestor of "science," a word whose original meaning in English was "knowledge."

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 01, 2010 is:

advert • \ad-VERT\  • verb
1 : to turn the mind or attention *2 : to call attention in the course of speaking or writing : make reference

Example sentence:
"Adverted to in the very first 'Star Wars' film, the Clone Wars take place in the narrative gap between 'Attack of the Clones' and 'Revenge of the Sith,' when Anakin Skywalker is still on the not-dark side of the force." (Robert Lloyd, Los Angeles Times, October 3, 2008)

Did you know?
You may be familiar with the noun "advert," which is used, especially in British sources, as a shortened form of "advertising." That's one way to use "advert," but it has also been used as a verb in English since the 15th century. There's a hint about the origin of the verb in the idea of "turning" the mind or attention to something; the word derives via Anglo-French from the Latin verb "advertere," which in turn comes from Latin "vertere," meaning "to turn." "Vertere" is the ancestor of a number of words in English, including "controversy," "divert," "invert," "revert," and even "versatile." In addition, we'd like to turn your attention to one particular ''vertere" descendant: "avert," meaning "to avoid." Be careful to avoid mixing this one up with "advert."

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for June 30, 2010 is:

Wellerism • \WELL-uh-riz-um\  • noun
: an expression of comparison comprising a usually well-known quotation followed by a facetious sequel

Example sentence:
My father's favorite Wellerism is "'We'll have to rehearse that,' said the undertaker as the coffin fell out of the car."

Did you know?
Sam Weller, Mr. Pickwick's good-natured servant in Charles Dickens' The Pickwick PapersK, and his father were fond of following well-known sayings or phrases with humorous or punning conclusions. For example, in one incident in the book, Sam quips, "What the devil do you want with me, as the man said, w[h]en he see the ghost?" Neither Charles Dickens nor Sam Weller invented that type of word play, but Weller's tendency to use such witticisms had provoked people to start calling them "Wellerisms" by 1839, soon after the publication of the novel.