verbicide

Pronounced: VUR-buh-side, noun

Notes: I didn’t know this word, but have known instances of it

---

Yesterday’s word

The word politick means “to engage in (usually partisan) political activity”

First usage

This word came into English in the late 1800s

Background / Comments

I thought that our word was obsolete; we use politic and politics, and our word looks like an old spelling. Our word is a verb and was created from the noun politicking, which came from politic (pragmatic; shrewd), which came from the Old French word politique (political). The Old French word came from the Latin word politicus (political), which came from the Greek work politikos (political), which is taken from the word polis (city).