Author Archives: Richard

Pronounced: POT-val-uhr, noun Notes: I didn’t know the meaning of the word, but after seeing it, it made sense Yesterday’s word The word ratiocination is First usage Our word came into English in the early to mid-1500s Background / Comments Our word seems to fit the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes. Edgar Allen Poe used ourContinue reading “pot-valor”

Pronounced: rah-tee-oh-suh-NAY-shun, noun Notes: I saw “ratio” in the word and mispronounced it Yesterday’s word The word gazunder means “to reduce the amount of an offer after it has been accepted by the seller” First usage Our word came into English in the 1980s Background / Comments As I noted, I’ve never run across thisContinue reading “ratiocination”

Pronounced: guh-ZUHN-duhr, verb Notes: I have not heard this word before Yesterday’s word The word bricolage is “construction or something constructed by using whatever comes to hand” First usage Our word came into English in the 1960s Background / Comments Our word came from the French word bricolage (do-it-yourself), which came from bricoler (to doContinue reading “gazunder”

Pronounced: bree-koh-LAHZH, noun Notes: I’ve never run across this word Yesterday’s word The word traject, as a verb, means “to transport; to transmit”. As a noun, it means “transport; transmission; passage” First usage Our word came into English in the mid-1500s (for the noun) and the early 1600s (for the verb). Background / Comments OurContinue reading “bricolage”

Pronounced: truh-JEKT, verb/noun Notes: I know “trajectory”, but not this word Yesterday’s word The word colloquy means First usage Our word came into English in the mid-1500s Background / Comments If you thought of “colloquial”, you did well: “colloquial” came a couple of hundred years after colloquy. Our word came from the Latin word loquiContinue reading “traject”

Pronounced: KAH-luh-kwee, noun Notes: You might be able to guess at the definition Yesterday’s word The word homophone is “a word or phrase that, when spoken, appears to be the same as a different word or phrase on a person’s lips” First usage Our word came into English in the late 1800s Background / CommentsContinue reading “colloquy”

Pronounced: HAHM-uh-feen, noun Notes: I recognized the parts of our word, but I didn’t know what it meant Yesterday’s word The word catawampus means “askew; awry; cater-cornered” First usage Our word came into English in the mid-1800s Background / Comments When I was growing up, things that were diagonal from each other were called “kitty-corner”Continue reading “homophene”

Pronounced: ka-tuh-WAHM-puhs, adj Notes: You may know this word, but the background is rather interesting Yesterday’s word The word heteroclite, as a noun, means As an adjective, it means First usage Our word came into English in the late 1500s Background / Comments I really like this word – I hope I remember it enoughContinue reading “catawampus”

Pronounced: HET-uhr-uh-klite, noun/adj Notes: A nice word to start using Yesterday’s word The word cliometrics is “the application of methods developed in other fields (such as economics, statistics, and data processing) to the study of history” First usage Our word came into English in the 1960s Background / Comments The American economists Douglass North andContinue reading “heteroclite”

Pronounced: klie-uh-MEH-tricks, noun Notes: I thought that might be related to climate Yesterday’s word The word homologate means “to approve officially – especially a car, engine, etc, for sale in a particular market or for its use in racing” First usage Our word came into English in the mid-1600s Background / Comments From the definition,Continue reading “cliometrics”