Pronounced: SHAW-d(uh)n-froy-duh, noun
Notes: The word is familiar, but I was not sure of the definition
Yesterday’s word
The word blackleg means
- one who works while other workers are on strike
- a swindler, especially in games such as gambling
- one of various diseases of plants or cattle
First usage
Our word came into English in the early 1700s
Background / Comments
I was a bit curious about the first definition; I thought such a person was called a “scan”; it turns out that our word is more commonly used in the UK. The origin of the first two terms above is unclear; the diseases were called that because the legs may look black on cattle or sheep; on plants, the stem has black spots.
Richard's Vocabulary Word-of-the-Day 