Pronounced: NID-uh-fih-kate, verb
Notes: A useful word to know
Yesterday’s word
The word hegira means “a journey or migration, especially when taken to escape an undesirable situation”
First usage
This word came into English in the late 1500s
Background / Comments
This word came from the flight of Muhammad from Mecca to Medina in 622 in order to escape persecution. It comes from the Arabic noun hijra (departure), which came from the verb hajara (to depart).
Rejected word
I chose to not use the word tyro (a beginner in learning; novice) because I happened to know it. I did not know that it could be spelled tiro. It originally (in Latin) meant a young soldier or new recruit. I ran across the word in the Star Trek novel Enterprise The First Adventure (at least, that’s what I think… I’m not sure what happened to my copy of that book, but I think it was there that I first read it).
Richard's Vocabulary Word-of-the-Day 