vermeil

Pronounced: VURR-mil (alt: VURR-mile), adj/noun

Notes: This word is one I often get wrong

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Yesterday’s word

The word horripilation means “goose flesh; goose bumps; a bristling of the hair on the skin from cold or fear”

First usage

Our word came into English in the mid-1600s

Background / Comments

I could see parts of the word “horror” and “pilation” (which I thought was related to hair) in this word, but didn’t realize it referred to “goose bumps”. Apparently, this phenomenon is also known as “gooseflesh”, which I’ve run across in UK books (but it doesn’t seem to be limited to British English usage). Our word comes from the Latin word horripilātiōn, which is a stem of horripilātiō. This is related to the verb horripilāre (to become bristly), which has root parts of horrēre (to bristle with fear) and pilus (hair).