Pronounced: VUHL-nuh-rer-ee, noun/adj
Notes: Another word that is new to me
Yesterday’s word
The word groundling is
- a spectator who stood in the pit of an Elizabethan theater
- a person of unsophisticated taste
First usage
Our word came into English around 1600s
Background / Comments
In Elizabethan times, people who attended plays could (if they could afford it) sit in the upper gallery. The poor people could only afford the penny admission to the pit below, where that had to sit or stand on the bare floor, exposed to the sun or rain. The wealthy patrons in the upper galley would look at the folks in the pit (called the “ground”) with disdain — and thus the term for these people arose: groundling. These days, groundling can refer to the uncouth, but can also refer to any ordinary person; the “average Joe”. Such a usage is usually used in a facetious way).
Richard's Vocabulary Word-of-the-Day 