Category: Word of the Day – L

ETYMOLOGY
possibly from rhyming sl. “little Mary Kelly” = belly

EXAMPLE
“… But when two Acts and a -half have gained our hearts, and all the characters have won our admiration and compelled our sympathies, should we be harshly severe on one lapsus linguae? Is this to be for us a casus belli against Mr. Barrie? Decidedly not. Goodnatured British audiences have strong Little Maries. It is enough that the absurd persons on the stage should turn up their noses and resent the utterance of the objectionable word so simply and prettily pronounced by innocent dainty Moira, without the audience imitating their stupid example. …”

From: Punch, or The London Charivari
October 14, 1903
Dr. Barrie’s “Little Minister” of the Interior

ETYMOLOGY
obsolete lusk (an idle or lazy fellow, a sluggard) + -ish

EXAMPLE
“… And as it fareth in the traunces and slepes that folke fall in by the bely – so fareth it lykewyse in the traunces and slepes that folke fall in by those partes that are benethe the bely. For whan the rage is thereof (as Tyndall sayeth) ouer passed, and that they haue in theyr traunce and theyr slepe played out all theyr luskysshe lustes … than they awake. …”

From: The Second Parte of the Confutacion of Tyndals answere in whyche is also confuted the chyrche that Tyndale deuyseth
By Thomas More, 1533

ETYMOLOGY
from Old French losenger = Provencal lauzengar, Spanish lisonjar, Portuguese lisonjear, Italian lusingare; 
from Old French losenge, losange (flattery) = Provencal lauzenga, lauzenja, Spanish, 
Portuguese lisonja;
apparently adopted by the other Romance languages, from Provencal lauzenga = Old French loenge (French louange) (praise)
from medieval Latin laudemia, a derivative Latin laud-em (praise)

EXAMPLE
“… Thanne began Glaucus to call her and losenge her. …”

From: The Metamorphoses of Ovid 
Translated by William Caxton, 1480

ETYMOLOGY
from liver (the bodily organ regarded as the seat of cowardice (usually characterized as light-coloured or white), obs.) + faced

EXAMPLE
“… “Only a little crack’d, ever since that one-eyed, liver-faced spalpeen came athurt us – a hard hiccup to his dying speech!“

“What one-eyed, liver-faced spalpeen do you mean?” asked Elwin.
“Did I say them words then, your honor ?” said Tade, ” ’cause if I did, I must be dreamin’, for divil sich a parson I ever see, since my mother weaned me.” …”

From: The Prediction
By Isabella Steward, 1834

ETYMOLOGY
from Latin libentia, from libentem, libens (willing)

EXAMPLE
“… They say the appetit confined to good is volent, and therfore free: but this volence is a meer libence, free from coactiv violence; no tru liberty to chus several objects; and therfore not arbitrary, becaus bar’d of indifferency. …”

From: Theoremata Theologica: = Theological Treatises.:
Octo theses theologicæ: eight theses of divinity
By Robert Vilvain, 1654

ETYMOLOGY
from leve (to believe, give credence to) + -able

EXAMPLE
“… Fower yomen leveable and discrete, prooved in that facultie of choosing, buyinge, and keepinge of all country wynes; thus everyche of them to pourvey by the Kinge’s commission, to be had by the Thesaurer of housholde’s record and seale, directed to the clerke of the crowne, to make suche commission for suche pourveyours, according to the statutes; …”

From: A Collection of Ordnances and Regulations 
for the Government of the Royal Household
From King Edward III to King William and Queen Mary
Also Receipts in Ancient Cookery
Printed 1790
Liber Niger Domus Regis Edw. IV., a1483

ETYMOLOGY
representing Old English type líegestre, feminine agent-noun to leogan,
from lie (to tell a lie)

EXAMPLE
“… “Yif ich say ich hadde a hi-leman,
“That ich leighe meselue opon :
“Than ich worth of old and yong
“Be hold leighster and fals of tong.
“Yete me is best take mi chaunce,
“And sle me childe, and do penaunce. …”

From: Lai le Freine, c1325
in Metrical romances of the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries: published from ancient manuscripts
By Henry William Weber, 1810

ETYMOLOGY
from Latin ludibundus, from ludere (to play)

EXAMPLE
“… I promise you, Hylobares, tho’ the fancy of Cuphophron may seem more ordinarily ludibund and lightsomely sportful, yet what he points at seems to be overlamentably true …”

From: Divine Dialogues, Containing Sundry Disquisitions & Instructions Concerning the Attributes and Providence of God
By Henry More, 1668

ETYMOLOGY
from Latin lepidus (pleasant; charming; witty)

EXAMPLE
“… In his daily walks into the fields, nothing pleased him so much as the chat of some well-informed fellow of the college, who would join him in quoting ‘sweet extemporaries’ from Gelius or Macrobius, or ‘in guessing at the lepid derivation’ of English words. To those who were of his own standing, it is to be feared that his conceit and pedantry proved in many cases offensive. …”

From: Simonds D’Ewes in John Howard Marsden’s College Life in the Time of James the First, 1851
Chapter IV: D’ewes’s Diligence in Study, and His Strict Observance of the Duties of Religion, c1619

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