Category: Word of the Day – O

ETYMOLOGY
from Latin oscitat-, past participial stem of oscitare (to open (as a mouth)), 
also oscitari (to gape, yawn), from os mouth + citare (to move, actuate)

EXAMPLE
“… and if he will but imitate some drowsy people at church, by taking a sternutatory, he will arrive at the close without feeling fatigue or ascribing his heaviness to the writer; There are persons whose physical constitutions are so delicate that mere thoughts of taking snuff, (and medicines generally) produce the same effect as inhaling the powder itself: now, if the imagination of the reader has a similar influence over his system, he can have no disposition to oscitate while finishing the chapter; on the contrary, the greatest obstacle to his progress will arise from a disposition to sneeze. …”

From: Transactions of the Society of Literary and Scientific Chiffonniers;
Being Essays on Primitive Arts In Domestic Life.
The Spoon
By Hab’k O. Westman, 1844
Chapter X, Snuff taken with Spoons

ETYMOLOGY
from Latin objicientem, present participle of objicere (to object)

EXAMPLE
“… Yet, it may be observed, in passing, such is precisely the discrepancy of which St. Thomas speaks, in the two passages which have been quoted in support of the objection. But the objicient may still press his difficulty. …”

From: The Metaphysics of the School
By Thomas Harper, 1879
Book III. Attributes of Being
Chapter III. Truth 
Proposition LXXXIII. Every Being, as such, is true.

ETYMOLOGY
from Anglo-Norman orguillous, orgeillus, orgoilous, orgullous,
orgulous, orgulus, orgilous, orgillus and Old French orguillus,
orgoillus, orguilleus, orgueilleux;
from  orgueil (pride, haughtiness) + ‑ous 

EXAMPLE 1 (for adj. 1.)
“… yet habbeþ manitime maked of watere wyn; gostliche. wanne þurch his grace maked of þo euele manne good man. of þe orgeilus umble. of þe lechur chaste. of þe niþinge large. and of alle oþre folies; so ha maket of þo watere wyn. þis his si signefiance of þe miracle. …”

From: An Old English miscellany containing a bestiary, Kentish sermons, Proverbs of Alfred, religious poems of the thirteenth century
Edited by Richard Morris, 1872

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EXAMPLE 2 (for adj. 1)
”…I was banished from my own country, and was dishonoured, and with hard labour gained I what I have got ; and now I stand in the King’s favour, and he asketh of me my daughters for the Infantes of Carrion. They are of high blood and full orgullous, and I have no liking to this match ; but if our Lord the King adviseth it we can do no other-wise: …”

From: Chronicle of the Cid
By Robert Southey, 1808

ETYMOLOGY
from other (adj.) + -ous

EXAMPLE
“… Things is dull enough now , and last summer wasn’t much otherous. ….”

From: A Glossary of Dialect and Archaic Words used in the County of Gloucester
By J. Drummond Robertson, 
Edited by Lord Moreton, 1890

ETYMOLOGY
from Latin omniscius all-knowing, from omni- + scire (to know) + -ous

EXAMPLE
“… Schoolemen may phantastically dreame, or philosophically discourse of new Adams, Salomons, and diuers putatiue wisemen, euen in that omniscious, and omnisufficient veine: but I wis such blacke Swans are very rare birds: and true prophets in the rightest, purest, and diuinest kinde, euen full as rare, or percase rarer, than they: as may haply be discussed more fully, and exactly, at more conuenient leisure. …”

From: A Discoursiue Probleme concerning Prophesies how far they are to be valued, or credited, according to the surest rules, and directions in diuinitie, philosophie, astrologie, and other learning;
By John Harvey, 1588

EXAMPLE
“…At Preston in Andernesse, August 17. 1648. Duke Hambleton resolving to play an Aftergame of Loyalty, entred England with an Army more numerous then well Disciplined. Most beheld him as one rather cunning than wise, yet rather wise, than valiant. However he had Officers who did Ken the War-craft, as well as any of our Age. He would accept of no English Assistance, so to engrosse all the work and wages to himself. Some suspect his Officers trust was undermined, (or over-moneyed rather) whilst others are confident, they were betrayed by none save their own security. …”

From: The History of the Worthies of England
By Thomas Fuller, a1661

ETYMOLOGY
from offence (an illegal act) + -ious

EXAMPLE
“…Retes
Tis Ramus, the Kings professor of Logick.

Guise,
Stab him.

Ramus.
O good my Lord, wherein hath Ramus been so offencious.

Guise.
Marry sir, in hauing a smack in all,
And yet didst neuer sound any thing to the depth.
Was it not thou that scoftes the Organon,
And said it was a heape of vanities?
He that will be a flat decotamest,
And seen in nothing but Epetomies:
Is in your iudgment thought a learned man….”

From: The Massacre at Paris:
With the Death of the Duke of Guise
By Christopher Marlowe, a1593

ETYMOLOGY
from Latin obtract-, past participial stem of obtractare,
variant of Latin obtrectare (to disparage) + ‑uous

EXAMPLE
“…and so made unlaufull assemble; and then and there the vayngloryouse Abbot of Eynesham callyd his seruants abowt hym and seid, How sey you, syrs? with obtractuouse words, and the vycar knoweth and can say yf he be a true man…”

From: Selections from the Record of the City of Oxford
Edited by William H. Turner, 1880
‘Proceedings in relation to certain Informations sent to the Privy Council by John Parkyns against the Abbots of Eynesham and Oseney’, Jan 18, 1537

ETYMOLOGY
from Latin olfact-, ppl. stem of olfacere (to smell)

EXAMPLE
“…The Indian is indeed light, but black and amare; the Syrian is flave, tuberous, to the gust acrimonious, to the olfact fragrant. The Arabians constitute onely two sorts thereof, the amare, and the sweet. And Clusius thinks there is but one kinde of Costus, and that it is onely called sweet, in reference to the more amare and acrimonious. Such a difference as this in sapour, we daily experience in Plants, which while fresh and new, are more sweet and suave; when inveterate, croded with worms, and corrupted, more amare, acrimonious, and insuave…”

From: A Medicinal Dispensatory
Of such Medicinal Materials as are requisite for Compositions made and kept in Apothecaries Shops
By  J. de Renou
Translated by Richard Tomlinson, 1657

ETYMOLOGY
from participle stem of Latin obambulare,
from ob- + ambulare (to walk)

EXAMPLE
“…Again, that al soules departed are in certaine receptacles vntill the generall iudgement, they do not obambulate and wander vp and downe, but remaine in places and states of happinesse or vnhappinesse, either in the hands of God, or in the Deuils prison…”

From: The Workes of John Boys
By John Boys, 1622