Today’s word of the day is pinchbeck, in the sense of “a cheap imitation.” It’s part of today’s list of the day, “not quite the real thing,” which contains words related to fakes, frauds, lies, and tricks.
Author Archives: Grant Barrett
Words that look like adverbs but aren’t
Slub
Today’s word of the day is slub:
1. transitive verb To draw out and twist (a strand of silk or other textile fiber) in preparation for spinning.
2. noun A soft thick nub in yarn that is either an imperfection or purposely set for a desired effect.
3. noun A slightly twisted roll of fiber, as of silk or cotton.
Salt and saltiness
Today’s list of the day is about salt and saltiness (the chemical, crystal kind, not the personality kind). It has words like adarce, a saltish concretion on reeds and grass in marshy grounds; halce, a salt liquor made of the entrails of fish, pickle, brine, etc.; and salsuginous, a rare word for saltish or somewhat salt.
Sub judice
Today’s word of the day (expression of the day?) is sub judice, an adverb indicating something is under judicial deliberation or before a judge or court of law. One might write, “When a case is pending or is ongoing, those connected with the case must refrain from talking about it to anyone because it is sub judice.”
A similar term is coram judice, before a judge having legal jurisdiction of the matter.
And there’s me judice, which means, “I being the judge” or “in my opinion.” An example use: “You have a fine chance (me judice) at this moment to put the popular feeling toward England into verse which shall ring from one end of the country to the other.”
Bedaphors
Today’s list of the day is made of words related to sleeping, such as sweven, stertorous, ahypnia, recubation, sloomy, and consopite.
Alectryomancy
Today’s word of the day is alectryomancy, an ancient practice of foretelling events by means of a rooster. The letters of the alphabet were traced on the ground in squares within a circle, and a grain of corn was placed on each; a rooster was then permitted to pick up the grains, and the letters under them, being formed into words in the order of their selection by the rooster, were supposed to foretell the event. Sometimes written alectoromancy.