Richard's Vocabulary Word-of-the-Day
Words that I do not know
Pronounced: PUN-dit, noun
Notes: Also written pandit. I’ve run across the word, but wasn’t sure of the definition
The work bibliophobe is someone who is afraid of books (or hates them or fears them)
I cannot find information about when this word entered English
Our word was pretty easy to parse: biblio- (book) combined with -phobe (fear). I’ve run across the word bibliophile (a lover of books), but never our word.
Pronounced: BIB-lee-uh-phobe, noun
Notes: Okay, this is (probably) an easy one, but I didn’t know this word existed
The (long) word hemidemisemiquaver is a 64th note, which I don’t think one finds very often
Our word came into English in the mid-1800s
According to what I’ve read, in the UK they use different names for musical notes that are used in America:
America UK
whole note semibreve
half note minim
quarter note crotchet
eighth note quaver
sixteenth note semiquaver
thirty-second note demisemiquaver
Once they get to quaver for the eighth note, different prefixes meaning “half” keep being added. The prefix semi- is Latin; demi- is French, and hemi- is Greek; thus, half of a half of a half of an eighth note is a 64th note. The word quaver comes from Middle English quaveren (to shake or tremble). In any event, most of the music I see doesn’t have anything smaller than a sixteenth note (semiquaver), but I do have a vague recollection of seeing 32nd notes in some work by Liszt or Chopin. Finally, if you noticed the semibreve in the list above and wondered if there is a breve, yes there is: the UK breve is a double whole note, and I don’t know the notation for that note, probably because of it’s rareness — you would need a time signature of 8/4 or equivalent (4/2 or 16/8).
Pronounced: hem-ee-dem-ee-SEM-ee-kway-vuhr, noun
Notes: Some people with a certain background may get this immediately
The word troth means
Our word came into English in the mid-1100s
I have run across our word in the phrase “plight one’s troth”; by my recollection, it was pronounced the second way (with a long “o” sound). I knew from the context that it meant a promise to marry, but that didn’t help much with the meaning of just “troth”. It turns out that it comes from the Middle English word trowthe or trouthe, which is a variant of treuthe (truth), which comes from Old English trēowth. The Old Norse word tryggth (faith) comes from a common ancestor. Incidentally, in the phrase plight one’s troth, the word plight is an obsolete form of “pledge”, so the phrase means to pledge one’s faithfulness.
Pronounced: trawth (alt: trohth), noun
Notes: I’ve run across this word, but didn’t quite know the meaning
The word dermatoglyphics means
Our word came into English in the 1920s
Did you spot what was unusual about our word? It has no repeated letters; in fact, this is one of the longest such word (‘uncopyrightable’ is another word; it is the same length as our word). You probably recognized “derma” as relating to the skin. In fact, a Dr Harold Cummins coined this word from the Greek word dermato- (skin) and glyphein (to carve).
Pronounced: duhr-mat-uh-GLIF-icks (alt: duhr-muh-tuh-GLIF-icks), noun
Notes: There is something very unusual about this word – can you spot it?
The word euthenics is “a science concerned with bettering human living conditions through the improvement of their environment”
Our word came into English in the 1900s
I recognized eu- as meaning “good” in Greek, and, sure enough, our word comes from the Greek word euthēneîn (to be well off; prosper), combined with -ics (a suffix denoting a body of facts, knowledge, or principles)
Pronounced: you-THEN-icks, noun
Notes: This is another word that is new to me
The word dubiety means “doubtfulness or uncertainty”
Our word came into English in the mid-1700s
When one is in doubt (dubiety), one is of two minds, and that is a clue to the origin; our word comes from the Latin word dubius (wavering), which comes from duo (two). From the same root, we get the word diploma (which is literally ‘folded in two’) and the word didymous (occurring in pairs; twin). One of the original twelve apostles, Thomas was called Didymus, per the book of John.
Pronounced: doo-BY-ih-tee (alt: dyoo-BY-ih-tee), noun
Notes: You might be able to guess the meaning of this word
The word foofaraw means
Our word came into English in the mid-1800s
Our word sounded a bit familiar. Our word came about on the western frontier of the United States. However, further background is not known. One theory is that it comes from the Spanish word fanfarrón (braggart; boaster), which may have come from the Arabic word farfār (talkative). Another theory is that our word comes from the French word fanfaron, which has the same meaning as the Spanish word. Perhaps both words combined to create our word on the western frontier.
Pronounced: FOO-fuh-raw, noun
Notes: I’ve run across this word, but only had a vague understanding of its meaning
The word suberous means “like cork in appearance or texture”
Our word came into English in the mid-1600s
The background of our word is pretty straightforward: it comes from the Latin word suber (cork oak). I saw the “sub” and thought of the prefix sub- (which means “below”) and thought maybe our word meant something like “underhanded”… but nothing so shady.
Pronounced: SUE-burr-us, adj
Notes: A good word, but I didn’t know it
The word noosphere is used in ecology and is “the biosphere including and modified by such human activities as agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry, urbanization, and industrialization”
Our word came into English in the 1940s
Our word came to us from the French word noösphere, which is made up of the Greek word nóos (mind) and the French word sphère (globe).
Pronounced: NO-uh-sfear, noun
Notes: Another word I don’t know
The word orotund means
Our word came into English in the late 1700s
Our word is a contraction of the Latin phrase ore rotundo (with a round moth), made up of ore, which comes from os (mouth) combined with rotundo, which comes from rotundus (round).
Richard's Vocabulary Word-of-the-Day