fructuous

Pronounced: FRUHK-choo-us (alt: FROOK-choo-us), adj

Notes: It’s been multiple years since I ran across this word, but I remembered it

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Yesterday’s word

The word epigram is

• a terse, sage, or witty and often paradoxical saying
• expression in the manner of such a saying

First usage

Our word has a couple of entrances into English; one in the 1400s, and a second in the late 1700s (see below)

Background / Comments

As I said yesterday, this was a borderline case; I kind of knew the meaning (I was a little off), but after reading the history of the word, I decided to include it. When our word first came into English, it referred to a poem and dealt concisely, pointedly, and satirically with a single idea or event. But by the second date above, our word came to be used for terse, witty sayings and not poetry. It’s not clear if the word was in usage throughout the 300-plus years, and the meaning just changed, or if the word was re-introduced. In any event, it is like having a double entrance into English. Our word came from the ancient Roman word epigramma, which came from the Greek word epigraphein (to write on), which is composed of epi- (upon) and graphein (to write). Both the Greeks and the Romans used the word to refer to short, witty, and (usually) satirical verse. There was a Roman poet named Martial who was a master of epigrams and published eleven books of epigrams between 86 and 98 AD.