Adroit Clever or skillful in using the hands or mind.Addle Make unable to think clearly confuse.īeing in love addled the young man, causing him to rethink every belief he'd ever held on the subject.When she broke up with him, he fell into a state of acedia and didn't leave the apartment for two months. Acedia Spiritual or mental sloth apathy.Williams, Livonia, Michigan, United States He looked through the ancient book, trying to make sense of its abstruse wording and concepts. Abstruse Difficult to understand obscure.Johnson, Whangarei, Nortland, New Zealand Absquatulate To discreetly leave a gathering or party without informing the host.Īt the party, I made such a fool of myself that I felt it was best to absquatulate after a half hour.Jennifer's neglect of her pets was abominable and inexcusable. Abominable Loathsome, odious or detestable.I wanted to join the school chess team, but soon realized I was an abecedarian when compared to the current members. Abate Become less intense or widespread.Īfter an hour in the cellar, we breathed easier as the sound of the wind began to abate.Not all these words will make our list of top choices, but there's a great deal of quality here, most are wonderful additions to anyone's vocabulary, and all could use some exercise. Many submissions have been edited for content, grammar and especially for accuracy. You're right - some never have been in fashion, but perhaps they deserve to be. Roscoe Pound, Frederic Edward Clements, "Physiography," Phytogeography of NebraskaĪre you ombrophilous, rain-loving, or ombrophobous, rain-shunning? The ombro- part of both words comes from the Greek ombros, "rain shower," while - philous comes from philos, "loving," and - phobous from phobos "fear, panic, terror.Here's a list of neglected but eminently useful words that visitors to this site - and we, to be downright honest - would like to bring back into fashion. "With reference to their behavior toward precipitation, plants are ombrophilous, or rain-loving, or ombrophobous, or rain-fearing." A night owl on an evening stroll, post-party drunks, insomniac superheroes - all noctivagant in our book. While noctivagant, wandering in the night, mainly refers to animals, we see an easy application to all things night-wandering. James Russell Lowell, Charles Eliot Norton, Letters "The bat that can resist all these inducements must be little better than a brickbat, and yet who ever knew one of those wayward, noctivagant creatures to condescend even to such terms?" However, we'd argue there is one: moonglade, "the track of moonlight on water."Ī glade, in addition to meaning "an open space in a forest," also once referred to "a clear or bright space in the sky a flash (of light or lightning)," says the OED. The Turkish gumusservi, "moonlight shining on water," is often included in lists of awesome words with no English equivalent. Lucy Maud Montgomery, "A Soul That Was Not at Home," Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1909 to 1922 "Do you know what happened to the Youngest Twin Sailor once? He was sailing and he sailed right into a moonglade." Hibernate, while related, comes from the Latin hīberna, "winter quarters," and hībernus, "wintry." While it's true most of us won't have the opportunity to use frondescence to refer to "the time at which each species of plants unfolds its leaves," it also means foliage in general. The oak and beech have as yet hardly any appearance of frondescence." "The foliage of the trees is nearly as late as last year. " Letter from France: Call Me in September," Newsweek, August 8, 2004Įstivation is "the act of passing the summer." According to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the word comes from the Latin aestivation-, aestivatio, which means "summer pasturing," and in botany, the "folded arrangement of petals and sepals in a flower bud."Įarlier this fall, estivate was Fritnancy's word of the week. "In the evenings, while they force down obligatory eight-course gastronomies prepared by celebrity chefs at Relais & Chateaux resorts, we contentedly order the plat du jour at a little bistro not far from our humble two-star hotel - simple economies that help make our vacation savings last our four-week estivation." Apricity comes from the Latin apricus, "having lots of sunshine" or "warmed by the sun." To apricate means to bask in the sun.
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