ACFLMNOO

Word of the Week

A feature wherein TileHead highlights a word that is is especially interesting or unusual (and, incidentally, useful in Scrabble play):

ACFLMNOO

(unscramble the letters to form this week's word...)

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(answer below, after a little more spoiler space....)

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This week's word is...

MOONCALF (n. pl. MOONCALVES)

• Definition:
  
  1. a foolish person
  2. a daydreamer; someone absent-minded, distracted, or given to sentimentality
  3. a deformed animal; a monster (mostly obsolete)
  4. an animal imagined to inhabit the moon (used in science fiction writings)

• Front hooks: (none)
• Back hooks: (none)
• Anagrams: (none)
• Longer extensions: (none)
• Wraparounds: (none)
• Other Spellings: (none)
• Related Forms: (none)

TileHead says:

This word was originally used (in the 1500s and 1600s) to refer to an aborted or deformed fetus, "formerly regarded as being produced by the influence of the moon" (OED), or to any monster or deformed creature.  Vestiges of such folk beliefs about the power of the moon also show up in words such as LUNATIC (from the Latin luna, "moon") and MOONSTRUCK.

As belief in the influence of the moon waned, MOONCALF's meaning gradually softened to "a foolish person; a simpleton" or to "a person who daydreams or behaves in an absent-minded or sentimental manner," and these are the most common current definitions. 

Stephano: Moon-calfe, speak once in thy life, if thou beest a good moon-calfe.
Caliban: How does thy honor? Let me lick thy shoe. I'll not serve him: he's not valiant.
Trinculo: Thou liest, most ignorant monster...
– William Shakespeare, The Tempest (c. 1610)

"But Mr. Dunston is not a mooncalf, and the compliments he paid me were very pretty."
– Georgette Heyer, Black Sheep (1966)

"I suspect Sara is plotting in my favor, but I can't leave you up here in London wandering around with that sick mooncalf expression on your face."
– Nita Abrams, A Question of Honor (2002)