Lexico

Word of the Day: GULIST

ETYMOLOGY
from Latin gula (gullet, appetite, gluttony) + -ist

EXAMPLE
“… He that sell’s himselfe to the custome of disloyalty to his Creator, become’s ignorant of his offence; and, instead of correction, prove’s unskilfull in the knowledge of his sinne. The gluttonous satiety of our swelling Gulists, argue’s their necessity of offending by forgetfulnes: and their own abundance barr’s them frō the just weighing of the poverty of the distressed. The common drunkard cannot be taken with a due thanks-giving for that superfluity which he corrupt’s, from whence many thirstie soules might sucke a reasonable supply for necessity. …”

From: The Honor of Chastity
By John Featley, 1632

Word of the Day: EPISTOLIST

ETYMOLOGY
from Latin epistola (epistle) + -ist

EXAMPLE
Mrs. Carter to Miss Talbot, Deal, April 16, 1743.
“… I am extremely obliged to you, my dear Miss Talbot, for your account of the Italian epistolists. I find I am not likely to be much edified by their sense, but they may perhaps be of use to me in gaining the improvement I wish for in the language. …”

From: A Series of Letters Between Mrs. Elizabeth Carter and Miss Catherine Talbot, from the year 1741 to 1770
By Elizabeth Carter, 1743

Word of the Day: LEGIFEROUS

ETYMOLOGY
from Latin legifer (law-giving); (from legi-, lex (law) + -fer (bearing, bringing)) + -ous

EXAMPLE
“… When both joynd issue to Entertaine the King
(Your Royall Grandfather of blessed memory)
Then did the issues of the Schollars braine
Put Ignoramus on’s Legiferous straine …”

From: Ignoramus. Or, The Academical Lawyer
By Ferdinando Parkhurst, 1662
in The Prologues and Epilogues of the Restoration 1660-1700
By Pierre Danchin, 1981

Word of the Day: TARDIGRADE

ETYMOLOGY
from French tardigrade (slow-paced) or from Latin tardigradus (walking slowly); from Latin tardus (slow) + -gradus (stepping, going)

EXAMPLE (for adj. 1)
“… Once more a cruelly long passage fell to my lot. The Deborah proved a marine hackney-coach of the most tardigrade order. But it could not be helped; so, like Diogenes, I resolved to be satisfied with my tub, and as for sunshine, I found it within and without! …”

From: Our Antipodes:
Or, Residence and Rambles in the Australasian Colonies.
By Lt. Colonel Godfrey Charles Mundy, 1852

Word of the Day: NECATION

ETYMOLOGY
from Latin necation-, necatio (killing); from Latin necat-, past participial stem of necare (to kill); (from nec-, nex (death, violent death)) + ‑iō ‑(ion)

EXAMPLE
“… Yet such an inveterate poacher was he that at the next sessions he was “up” again for a like offence at the same place, save that on this second charge the evidence seems to have extended to “exagitation” only, and not to “necation.”…”

From: The Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Magazine
Volume XIX, 1881
Extracts from the Records of the Wiltshire Quarter Sessions.
‘Trespass in Pursuit of Game. Licence to Shoot’

Word of the Day: FROBLY-MOBLY

ETYMOLOGY
of unknown origin

EXAMPLE
“… If people felt but indifferently well, they said they were frobly-mobly; if they had swollen faces, they spoke of boun muns; if they were ready to faint, they said coath. …”

From: All The Year Round:
A Weekly Journal
Conducted by Charles Dickens, Jun.
Volume IV. From June 4, to November 26, 1870
‘In the Provinces ‘

Word of the Day: REPRUCE

ETYMOLOGY
from Anglo-French repruce, variant of reproche (reproach)

EXAMPLE
“… Þou settest us repruse [MS depruse.] to our neȝburs, vndernimyng [Here an e follows, but is dotted out.] and scorne to hem þat ben in our cumpas. …”

From: The Earliest Complete English Prose Psalter, c1350
Preface, introduction, notes, and glossary, by Karl D. Bülbring, 1891

Word of the Day: THINKATIVE

ETYMOLOGY
from think (vb.) + -ative, chiefly after talkative

EXAMPLE
“… They have not known I say, that the knowledge of Observation, doth not introduce an understanding into the essential thingliness of a thing, but erecteth only a thinkative knowledge: For otherwise, the understanding should perceive causes that are before in essence. Then also they have been deceived by the simplicity of the Water, which simpleness they have confounded with the unity of knowledge to us unknown. …”

From: Oriatrike or, Physick Refined
By Jean Baptiste van Helmont
Translated by J. Chandler, 1662

Word of the Day: ILL-LOOKING

ETYMOLOGY
from ill (adj.) or (adv.) + looking, present participle of look (vb.)

EXAMPLE
“… That gawdy eare-wrig, or my lord your patron,
Whose pensioner you are. — I ‘le teare thy throat out,
Sonme of a cat, ill-looking hounds-head, rip up
Thy ulcerous maw, if I but scent a paper,
A scroll, but halfe as big as what can cover
A wart upon thy nose, a spot, a pimple,
Directed to my lady: it may prove
A mysticall preparative to lewdnesse. …”

From: The Broken Heart
By John Ford, 1633

Word of the Day: DUPLE

Note: the obsolete adjective definition is a general sense.
In mathematics, it is applied to the proportion of two quantities one of which is double of the other;
in music, it is applied to ‘time’ or rhythm having two beats in the bar.

ETYMOLOGY
Adj. and n.: from Latin duplus (double), from duo (two) + -plus, from root ple- (to fill);
Vb.: from Latin duplare (to double), from dupl-us (duple)

EXAMPLE (for vb.)
“… She mixd of Quick-silver a deadly weight,
That dupled force his murder hasten might.
Then while those baneful pots betwixt them strov,
The helpful swaying the hurtfuls bane out drov. …”

From: Enchiridium epigrammatum Latino-Anglicum:
An epitome of essais,
Englished out of Latin by Robert Vilvain, 1654