ACFLMNOO

Word of the Week

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ACFLMNOO

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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)

"If a word..."

Quote of the Week:

If a word in the dictionary were misspelled, how would we know?
– Steven Wright (1955- )

EEILLTVY

Word of the Week

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EEILLTVY

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This week's word is...

VELLEITY (n. pl. VELLEITIES)

• Definition: A mere wish, desire, or inclination without accompanying action or effort; a low degree of desire

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

TileHead says:

This word seems to have fallen out of fashion, which is a pity given that it describes such a common feeling or situation.  VELLEITY stems from the Latin velle ("to will, to wish"), the same root that also gave English words such as BENEVOLENT and MALEVOLENT.  It has been used in English since the early 1600s and still makes rare appearances in modern writings:

The antecedent will of God is only a velleitie or wishing that a thing might be.
– Francis White, A Replie to Jesuit Fishers Answere (1624)

"He had no fixed intentions, only rebellious impulses, blind longings and velleities."
– James Anthony Froude, Thomas Carlyle: A History of His Life in London, 1834-1881 (1884)

The old fear that Lenora might divorce him and go away with Morris Langdon did not trouble him any more. Any inclination he had once had toward the Major seemed now a mere velleity compared to his feelings for the soldier.
– Carson McCullers, Reflections in a Golden Eye (2000)

Finally, the following Ogden Nash poem explains the word with both accuracy and humor:

Seated one day at the dictionary I was pretty weary and also pretty ill at ease,
Because a word I had always liked turned out not to be a word at all, and suddenly I found myself among the v's.
And suddenly among the v's I came across a new word which was a word called velleity,
So the new word I found was better than the old word I lost, for which I thank my tutelary deity,
Because velleity is a word which gives me great satisfaction,
Because do you know what it means, it means low degree of volition not prompting to action,
And I always knew I had something holding me back but I didn't know what,
And it's quite a relief to know it isn't a conspiracy, it's only velleity that I've got...
– Excerpt from Ogden Nash's "Where There's a Will, There's Velleity" (1938)

"A mind always employed"

Quote of the Week:

A mind always employed is always happy. This is the true secret, the grand recipe, for felicity.
– Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)

ABEEHNS (2)

Word of the Week

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ABEEHNS (2)

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This week's word is...

SHEBEAN (n. pl. -S)

• Definition: an unlicensed or illegally operated drinking establishment: a speakeasy; sometimes, a drinking-party in general

• Front hooks: (none)
• Back hooks: S
• Anagrams: BANSHEE (a female spirit – see below)
• Longer extensions: (none)
• Wraparounds: (none)
• Other Spellings: SHEBEEN
• Related Forms: (none)

TileHead says:

The etymology of SHEBEAN/SHEBEEN is a little uncertain, but it probably derives from the Irish Gaelic sibin ("bad ale") or the Irish seapa ("shop").  The English word SHEBANG, meaning "a situation or matter" (frequently seen in the phrase "the whole shebang"), may derive from a similar source.

The South African Government, after years of battling to control illicit drinking dens, known as shebeens, in black townships, has conceded defeat and legalized them.
– Article in The Times (of London), May 1980

I've... seen him standing up there on one of those outcrops overlooking the company's buildings as if he'd like to call down fire from heaven on the whole shebang.
– Vance Palmer, Golconda (1948)

By a strange coincidence, the anagram BANSHEE also derives from Irish, namely the Old Irish ben side ("woman of the fairies").  A banshee (also spelled BANSHIE) is a female spirit that "warns a family of the approaching death of a member by her appearance or especially by wailing unseen under the windows of the house a night or two before the time of the death she foretells" (W3).  The phrase "scream like a banshee" (or "wail like a banshee" or similar) comes from this legend.

"Words obey my call"

Quote of the Week:

...At length
My darling understands it all,
Because I have come into my strength,
And words obey my call.
– William Butler Yeats (1865-1939), Irish poet and dramatist, "Words" (1910)

AAELORTY

Word of the Week

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AAELORTY

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This week's word is...

ALEATORY (adj.)

• Definition: dependent on chance or luck; dependent on a random event or uncertain contingency; of or characterized by gambling; in law, a contract dependent on a contingent event; in music or art, consisting of random or indeterminate elements

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

TileHead Says:

Something ALEATORY is, literally or figuratively, contingent on the throw a die.  It derives from the Latin aleator ("a dice player"), from alea ("a die" or "a dice game").  Legend has it that Julius Caesar cried "Jacta est alea!" ("the die is cast!") when he famously crossed the Rubicon River in 49 BC, starting a civil war.  The historical record is murky on whether he actually said those words, but both "the die is cast" and "crossing the Rubicon" survive today as phrases used to refer to a course of action that has been determined or to any situation beyond the point of no return.

Returning to our English words ALEATORY and ALEATORIC, as used in modern writings:

But then I know it is not true and that the clock in the belly of the alligator is ticking with no relation to what I am thinking or feeling and all is aleatory, disjunctive...
– Edith A. Jenkins, Against a Field Sinister: Memoirs and Stories (1991)

But this story conveys a marvellous feeling for the aleatory, the randomness of life's moments of making sense.
– Article in the West Coast Review (1986)

The pianist, who seemed as drunk as his leader, was doing something atonal and aleatoric; meanwhile drummer and bassist assured the dancers that this was still the dance they had started off to dance.
– Anthony Burgess, Tremor of Intent (1966)

Every Scrabble player is familiar with the concept of ALEATORY events, if not the word itself.  One might argue that a great part of the allure of the game of Scrabble is its near-perfect blending of skill on the one hand and the aleatory element of tile-drawing on the other.  Every game is different, and every dip into the tile bag brings fresh challenges and opportunities.

"Luck enters into every contingency"

Quote of the Week:

Luck enters into every contingency. You are a fool if you forget it – and a greater fool if you count upon it.
– Phyllis Bottome (1884-1963)

IORSSTU (2)

Word of the Week

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IORSSTU (2)

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This week's word is...

TSOURIS (plural-only noun)

• Definition: troubles, worries, woes; aggravation; a series of misfortunes

• Front hooks: (none)
• Back hooks: (none)
• Anagrams: SUITORS (pl. of SUITOR n., one who courts a woman)
• Longer extensions: (none)
• Wraparounds: (none)
• Other Spellings: TSORES, TSORIS, TSURIS, TZURIS, TSOORIS, TSORRISS
• Related Forms: (none)

TileHead Says:

This remarkable word derives from the Yiddish tsore ("trouble, woe") and ultimately from the Hebrew sarar ("to become narrow" or "to be in distress, to be troubled").  Because Yiddish is written in the Hebrew alphabet, English words based on it have gone through TRANSLITERATION ("the representation of letters or words in the characters of another alphabet or script").  And since transliteration is an inexact science, spelling variations abound with such words.  TSOURIS, for example, is notable for having seven valid spellings!  Note that all forms of this word are considered to be plural-only constructions in English: trouble begets trouble, it would seem.

The word is often used in interesting and evocative ways in literature and memoir.

"It wasn't enough you followed me every day for weeks and brought such tsooris raining down on me?" he asked her. "You have to follow me wherever I go like a dog? There's nobody else you can haunt?"
–Gerald Shapiro, From Hunger: Stories (1993)

I see I have much work to do to help my nephew. There is tsouris everywhere my boy, but there is always more if this is all you see.
– Thane Rosenbaum, Elijah Visible: Stories (1999)

She taught him about anxiety and tsuris, about bearing the weight of the world on your shoulders, and – most important of all – about the benefits of an occasional good cry.
– Paul Auster, Timbuktu (2009)

"Apt words"

In Other Words...
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Apt words have power to swage
The tumors of a troubl'd mind.
– John Milton, Samson Agonistes (1671)

BCDEEINT

Word of the Week

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BCDEEINT

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This week's word is...

BENEDICT n. pl. -S

• Definition: A newly married man, especially an apparently confirmed bachelor who marries

• Front hooks: (none)
• Back hooks: -S
• Anagrams: (none)
• Longer extensions: -ION(S), -ORY
• Wraparounds: (none)
• Other Spellings: BENEDICK (n. pl. -S)
• Related Forms: (none)

TileHead says:

The only definition of this word currently in use comes directly from the character of that name in William Shakespeare's comedy Much Ado About Nothing (c. 1600).  Benedick proclaims he will never marry and denies his love for Beatrice until the very end of the play, when the two characters finally admit their love for each other and make plans to tie the knot.  Thus the word came to refer to a newly married man who was previously set against marriage, or as Ebenezer Cobham Brewer memorably stated in his famous Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, "a sworn bachelor caught in the wiles of matrimony."

In Shakespeare's time the word BENEDICT / BENEDICK could also mean "blessed, benign" or in medicine "something mildly laxative," as in "Rhubarb and other Medicines that are benedict" (Francis Bacon, 1626).

Until recently, BENEDICT was most properly used to mean "a perennial bachelor sworn to celibacy" (after St. Benedict, famous for celibacy), while BENEDICK was used to mean "a sworn bachelor who eventually marries" (after the Shakespearean character).  Nowadays the two words are used more-or-less interchangeably to refer to a newly married man who has long been a bachelor.

All of these names and words, by the way, derive from the Latin benedictus ("blessed").  Other words from the same root include BENISON, BENEDICTION, and BENEDICTORY.

"It is on my planet!"

In Other Words...
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[Family is playing Scrabble]
Steve Smith: QUIVECS? That's not a word.
Roger the Alien: It is on my planet!
Francine Smith: Is it a proper noun?
[beat]
Roger the Alien: Damn!
[rearranges letters]
– In the TV series American Dad! (2005)

EELORTUV (2)

Word of the Week

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EELORTUV (2)

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This week's word is...

TRUELOVE n. pl. -S

• Definition: a faithful lover; a sweetheart; a beloved

• Front hooks: (none)
• Back hooks: -S
• Anagrams: REVOLUTE (adj. rolled backward or downward)
• Longer extensions: (none)
• Wraparounds: (none)
• Other Spellings: (none)
• Related Forms: (none)

TileHead says:

TRUELOVE is a very old word, having been recorded as treowlufu in Old English writings and and as trewe loue (and other variations) in Middle English writing from the 1300s.  Indeed, it has survived through the ages with a similar meaning, seemingly as faithful and enduring as the concept it describes.

Lo this is he that with his flaterye
Bytraised hath & don hire vilenye
That was his trewe loue in thought & dede.
(Modern translation:
Lo this is he that with his flattery
Betrayed hath and done her villainy
That was his truelove in thought and deed.)
– Geoffrey Chaucer, "Legend of Good Women" (c. 1385)

Fly, Lady-Bird, North, South, or East, or West,
Fly where the Man is found that I love best.
He leaves my hand, see to the West he's flown,
To call my true-love from the faithless town.
– John Gay, "Thursday: Or, The Spell" (1720)

I am a lady young in beauty waiting
Until my truelove comes, and then we kiss.
– John Crowe Ransom, "Piazza Piece" (1924)

Happy Valentine's Day!

"Spread the word"

In Other Words...
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Spread the word and you'll be free
Spread the word and be like be
Spread the word I'm thinking of
Have you heard the word is love?
– The Beatles, in the song "The Word" (1965)

ADEIQRU

Word of the Week

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ADEIQRU

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This week's word is...

QUERIDA n. pl. -S

• Definition: a female sweetheart, a darling (often used as a form of address); sometimes, a mistress

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

TileHead says:

English often picks and chooses selectively from other languages. This sweet word, stemming from the Spanish querer ("to love, desire, seek out"), has appeared in English since the early 1800s and is recorded in many dictionaries.  One would expect the masculine form, querido, to have received similar lexicographic treatment, but for some reason it is rarely listed and therefore is not acceptable in Scrabble play.

The "sweetheart" sense seems to be far more common nowadays, with the "mistress" sense having been more widely used in the past.

"I think you should be getting home, querida. If your mother should wake and find you gone, you know she'll worry."
– Meg Cabot, The Mediator Twilight (2005)

"Does it please you, querida?"
"I think it looks very quaint and pretty," replied Linda, who was prepared to be pleased with anything. "It looks like a home."
– Claude M. Girardeau, "Shop of the Green Door" (1906)

"English has pursued other languages..."

In Other Words...
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The problem with defending the purity of the English language is that... we don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle through their pockets for new vocabulary.
– James Nicoll (1961- )