Author: Lexico

Word of the Day: MISOGELASTIC

ETYMOLOGY
from miso- (hatred or dislike of), + Greek γελαστός (laughable) + -ic;
apparently after agelastic (never laughing, hating laughter)

EXAMPLE
“… We have in this world men whom Rabelais would call agelasts; that is to say, non-laughers; men who are in that respect as dead bodies, which if you prick them do not bleed. The old grey boulder-stone that has finished its peregrination from the rock to the valley, is as easily to be set rolling up again as these men laughing. No collision of circumstances in our mortal career strikes a light for them. It is but one step from being agelastic to misogelastic, and the μῖσογέλως, the laughter-hating, soon learns to dignify his dislike as an objection in morality. …”

From: New Quarterly Magazine, Vol. 8, 1877
On the Idea of Comedy, and of the Uses of the Comic Spirit
By George Meredith

Word of the Day: LETIFICATE

ETYMOLOGY
from Latin laetificat-, participial stem of laetificare (to make glad),
from laetificus (gladdening), from laetus (joyful)

EXAMPLE
“… There is nothing that doeth comfort the heart so much beside God, as honest myrth and good companie. And wine moderately taken, doeth letificate and doeth comforte the hearte, and good bread doeth confyrme and doeth stablyshe a mannes heart. …”

From: The Breuiary of Helthe
By Andrew Boorde, 1547

Word of the Day: RENIANT

ETYMOLOGY
from French reniant, pres. pple. of renier (to deny, renounce)

EXAMPLE
“… No helpe to me wardes is shapen: howe shal than straungers in any wyse after socoure loke, whan I that am so privy yet of helpe I do fayle? Further maye I not but thus in this prison abyde: what bondes and chaynes me holden, lady, ye se wel yourselfe? A renyant forjuged hath not halfe the care. But thus syghyng and sobbyng, I wayle here alone, and nere it for comfort of your presence, right here wolde I sterve. …”

From:
The Testament of Love
By Thomas Usk, 1388
In The workes of Geffray Chaucer newly printed. 1532

Word of the Day: JIMJAMS

ETYMOLOGY
a reduplicated term, of which the elements are unknown;
from the mid 16th century – in the singular, originally denoted a knickknack or small article

EXAMPLE (for n. 1)
“… Andy Collins, an Irishman, who has lived alone in his cabin, about a mile below us, for a year or more, has been a hard drinker ever since we have known him. He bought his rum by the gallon and kept soaked all the time. Tuesday night he had a bad attack of the jim-jams, and his nearest neighbor, O’Neil, heard him yelling and shrieking like all possessed. …”

From: The Diary of a Forty-Niner
By Chauncey Canfield, 1906
Chapter XVI, February 1, 1852

Word of the Day: PLURANIMOUS

ETYMOLOGY
from Latin plus, plur- (more) + animous;
after unanimous (from Latin unanimis, unanimus [from unus (one) + animus (mind)] + -ous)

EXAMPLE
“… Should I make a parallel of this present Basis with the former, & were I sure my Mare would not stumble, I could demonstrate it to be Heterogeneous, Heterodoxous, Incongrous, Omnigenous, Pluranimous, Versipellous, Centireligious, Nummiamorous; I thought I should hit it at length, but I take in Army and all, or else my Mare would soone stand on her head. …”

From: Discolliminium, or, A most obedient reply to a late book, called, Bounds & bonds, so farre as concerns the first demurrer and no further
By B. (Nathaniel Ward), 1650

Word of the Day: EGESTUOUS

ETYMOLOGY
from late Latin egestuosus, irregularly from egestas (poverty)

EXAMPLE
“… You call me oscitant, – ah! well,
Obtenebration hides my tears;
I may become sejungible,
When labefaction comes with years.
Exequial nights, egestuous days
No nummary relief can soothe, –
No xenodochium allays
Radicate thirst with “Bass” or “Booth.” …”

From: The Savage-Club Papers
Edited by Andrew Halliday, 1867
A Social Science Valentine, By Thomas Archer

Word of the Day: INNUBILOUS

ETYMOLOGY
from Latin innubilus, (from in- + nubilus (nubilous, cloudy, foggy, misty)) + -ous

EXAMPLE
“… Through the benignity of our largifical essence always inclin’d to succour the egestuosity of our votaries conceptions, and to inlighten their offuscated intellects upon the least petitionary susurration, we will now descend from our innubilous empireum to infuse some rays of knowledge for solving the problem of our obsequious querist, so far as is fit to be communicated to the humble spawn of earth; …”

From: The British Apollo,
Containing Two Thousand Answers to Curious Questions in Most Arts and Sciences, Serious, Comical, and Humorous
1st Edition, 1708-1711

Word of the Day: AIDANT

ETYMOLOGY
from Anglo-Norman aidaunt, aydaunt, and from Anglo-Norman and French aidant (helping, and helper, ally), present participle of aider (to aid)

EXAMPLE (for adj.)
“… All blest secrets all you vnpublisht vertues of the earth,
Spring with my teares beaydant (be aydant) and remediat,
In the good mans distresse, seeke, seeke, for him,
Lest his vngouernd rage dissolue the life.
That wants the meanes to lead it. …”

From: True Chronicle Historie of the Life and Death of King Lear and his three daughters
By William Shakespeare, 1608