ovation

LL-Q1860 (eng)-I learned some phrases-ovation.wav

/əʉˈvæɪ.ʃn̩/

Proceede then in your bleſt Inauguration, / And celebrate this Annuall Ovation; / Whilſt you nor this way, nor to that way leane, / But ſhunne th' extreames, to keepe the golden meane.

1631, Thomas Heywood, “Vlisses [i.e., Ulysses] His Speech”, in Londons Ius Honorarium. Exprest in Sundry Triumphs, Pagiants, and Shews: At the Initiation or Entrance of the Right Honourable George Whitmore, into the Maioralty of the Famous and Farre Renowned City of London. […], printed at London: By Nicholas Okes, →OCLC

As when a Wolf or Fox too long does fleece / The Non-reſiſting Lambs, or Paſſive Geeſe, / The Peaſants take th' alarm, and ſeize the Foe, / And ſhouting Boys in long Ovation go: […]

1708, Thomas Brown, “[Epigrams, Poems, and Satyrs, on Sir R—— Bl——re’s King Arthur & Prince Arthur, the Satyr against Wit, and Job & Habakkuk.] Upon the Pensioners in the Parliament.”, in The Works of Mr. Thomas Brown, in Prose and Verse. Serious, Moral, & Comical. In Three Volumes. …, 2nd edition, London: Printed by S[am] Briscoe, and sold by B. Bragg, […], →OCLC, page 160

I saw reverend prelates, who, tearing off their lawn, put themſelves into red coats, and ſoon obtained triumphs and ovations; while others dwindled into pariſh clerks, and village pedagogues.

1755 July 3, “Thursday, July 3, 1755”, in Adam Fitz-adam [pseudonym; Edward Moore], editor, The World, new edition, volume III, number 131, London: Printed for J[ames] Dodsley, […], published 1772, →OCLC, page 161

(by extension) A (ceremony for the) recognition of some achievement.

First things first – everyone at Southampton enjoyed a thrilling Euro 2020 qualifier that led to a rousing ovation for both sides at the conclusion of England's chaotic 5-3 victory.

2019 September 10, Phil McNulty, “‘England Horribly Fallible in Defence’ against Kosovo in Euro 2020 Qualifying”, in BBC Sport, archived from the original on 2019-09-15

(by extension) Prolonged enthusiastic applause.


big screen

Stars of the stage and the big screen gathered for the awards ceremony.

Jane Smith made her big-screen debut in 2005, appearing as a librarian in a Hollywood crime thriller.

(idiomatic, by extension) movies, or that which is related to movies or cinema.


revolver

→ Catalan: revòlver

→ Chuvash: ляворвăр (ljavorvăr)

→ Crimean Tatar: revolver

→ Danish: revolver

→ Dutch: revolver

→ Esperanto: revolvero

→ Finnish: revolveri

→ French: revolver

→ Gagauz: livorver

→ Galician: revólver

→ German: Revolver

→ Hungarian: revolver

→ Italian: revolver

→ Japanese: リボルバー (riborubā)

Norwegian:

→ Norwegian Bokmål: revolver

→ Norwegian Nynorsk: revolver

→ Polish: rewolwer

→ Portuguese: revólver

→ Russian: револьвер (revolʹver)

Serbo-Croatian:

→ Cyrillic script: револвер

→ Latin script: revolver

→ Spanish: revólver

→ Swedish: revolver

→ Urum: levorver

→ Yiddish: רעוואָלווער (revolver)

From revolve + -er, coined by American inventor Samuel Colt in 1835.

coin

(by extension) Any (personal) firearm with such a mechanism.


dragoon

Battle of Cerro Gordo
Battle of Jena–Auerstedt
Mexican–American War
Smithsonian Institution
Édouard Detaille

The noun is borrowed from French dragon (“dragon (mythological creature); type of cavalry soldier, dragoon”) (originally referring to a soldier armed with the firearm of the same name (sense 1.1)), ultimately from Latin dracō (“dragon; kind of serpent or snake”), from Ancient Greek δρᾰ́κων (drákōn, “dragon; serpent”), possibly from δέρκομαι (dérkomai, “to see, see clearly (in the sense of something staring)”), from Proto-Indo-European *derḱ- (“to see”)). Doublet of Draco, dracone, and dragon.
The verb is either derived:
* from the noun; or
* from French dragonner (“to force (someone) into doing something, coerce; to torment (oneself)”), from dragon (noun) (see above) + -er (suffix forming infinitives of first-conjugation verbs).

ref

From the collection of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., United States.

From the collection of the Musée de l'Armée (Army Museum) in Paris, France.

der

[T]he Lovv-countries haue produced another ſort of Horſe-men, vvhich their experience there haue found out to be of notable vſe, and they call them Dragoons, vvhich I knovv not vvhether I may tearme them Foot-Horſe-men, or Horſe-Footmen: for they are Muſquetiers on horſebacke, and are imployed for the taking and maintaining, or at leaſt for preuenting the enemy from taking of Paſſages or Foords vvhich leade ouer Riuers: […]

1622, Francis Markham, “Epist[le] 1. To the Right Honourable William Lord Evers. The Argument. Of the Officers of Caualarie.”, in Five Decades of Epistles of Warre, London: […] Augustine Matthewes, →OCLC, decad 3, page 83

(by extension) Originally (historical), a soldier armed with a dragoon musket (sense 1.1) who fought both on foot and mounted on a horse; now, a cavalier or horse soldier from a regiment formerly armed with such muskets.

dragonder

soldier armed with a dragoon musket; cavalier or horse soldier from a regiment formerly armed with such muskets

(by extension) A man with a fierce or unrefined manner, like a dragoon (sense 1.2).


dragoon

en-verb

dragoon (third-person singular simple present dragoons, present participle dragooning, simple past and past participle dragooned)

dragoons (present singular third-person)
dragooning (participle present)
dragooned (participle past)
dragooned (past)

The next step was that suggested by Mr. Townsend, of quartering large bodies of troops upon the chief towns in the colonies, and demanding of the several colonial legislatures, a provision for their comfortable support and accommodation. […] Their object was perfectly understood: it was to curb the just and honourable spirit of the people; to dragoon them into submission to the parliamentary claim of taxation, and reduce them to the condition of vassals, governed by the right of conquest.

1817, William Wirt, “Section III”, in Sketches of the Life and Character of Patrick Henry, Philadelphia, Pa.: James Webster, […]; William Brown, […], →OCLC, pages 78–79

For months and months and from one end of the country to the other the whole official force has been engaged in pulling wires to dragoon the party into the renomination of the President.
Speech at the Temple, St. Louis, Mo., July 22, 1872, published in the Daily Globe (St. Louis, Mo.; 23 July 1872).

1872 July 22, Carl Schurz, “Why anti-Grant and pro-Greeley”, in Frederic Bancroft, editor, Speeches, Correspondence and Political Papers of Carl Schurz […], volumes II (December 13, 1870 – February 27, 1874), New York, N.Y.; London: G[eorge] P[almer] Putnam’s Sons; The Knickerbocker Press, published 1913, page 405

[T]he union leaders in Pennsylvania are trying to dragoon the most exalted personage in the nation [the President] into a wrangle with which he has no official connection whatever.

1906 May 4, “No presidential intervention this time”, in The Sun, volume LXXIII, number 246, New York, N.Y.: The Sun Printing and Publishing Association, →OCLC, page 6, column 3

Chiefly followed by into: to force (someone) into doing something through harassment and intimidation; to coerce.

прину́дя

to force (someone) into doing something through harassment and intimidation — see also coerce

He [Samuel Wilson] says, for example, that he is opposed to locking men up without trial, but he refrains from pledging himself to releasing the suspects. He says nothing about the necessity for dragooning the Irish for abolishing trial by jury.

1881 December 3, “The issues in Derry”, in The Pall Mall Gazette: An Evening Newspaper and Review, volume XXXIV, number 5233, London: […] Richard Lambert, […], →OCLC, page 1, column 1

(military, historical) To cause (someone) to be attacked by dragoons.

usuttaa rakuunat

to cause (someone) to be attacked by dragoons


BIOS

(computing, informal, by extension) any firmware user interface that provides similar functionality as BIOS, such as UEFI


kipper

kipper (third-person singular simple present kippers, present participle kippering, simple past and past participle kippered)

kippers (present singular third-person)
kippering (participle present)
kippered (participle past)
kippered (past)

From Old English cypera (“male salmon”), perhaps related to Old English coper (“reddish-brown metal”) (see copper), on resemblance of color. Another theory connects it to kip (“sharp, hooked lower jaw of the male salmon in breeding season”), from Middle English kippen (“to seize, snatch”), but OED doubts this.

inh

"Your own fault. Did you imagine I was going to live on a gasring, because you wouldn't have your chimney repaired?" Then Diva got a tenant in spite of the kippered bathroom, and moved to a dilapidated hovel close beside the railway line, which she got for half the rent which she received for her house.

1935, Edward Frederic Benson, The Worshipful Lucia, page 252

“When I was in 23 Squadron,” Mayo said,”we had a pilot who could blow smoke through his ears.” “That doesn't make him dotty,” Goss said. “It might have kippered his brains,” Jimmy Duncan suggested.

So she let herself be crammed into a corner of the smelliest pub in town, slowly kippering in a haze of other people's cigarette smoke.

The gorgeous exhalation of millions of gaspers and fags and tabs and snouts and pipes and – my personal favourite– Panatelas, had kippered my walls for a century and a quarter.

(by extension) To damage or treat with smoke.


on the rag

From rag as a slang term for a menstrual pad. First use appears c. 1967. See cite below.

On the rag, in a bad mood.—College males, Arizona. I had a lousy time last night because she was on the rag.

1967, University of South Dakota, English Dept, Current Slang, Volumes 2-5, page 5

(idiomatic, derogatory, by extension) In a bad mood; angry or irritable.


impromptu

(by extension) Any composition, musical or otherwise, that is created on the spot without preparation.

импровизация

any composition, musical or otherwise, that is created on the spot without preparation


variegated

en-adj

variegated (comparative more variegated, superlative most variegated)

more variegated (comparative)
most variegated (superlative)

vârʹēəgā'tĭd

/ˈveəɹɪəˌɡeɪtɪd/

/ˈvæɹi.əˌɡeɪtɪd/

vârʹēəgā'tĭd

/ˈveəɹɪəˌɡeɪtɪd/


home stretch

I think we're finally on the home stretch with this project.

(figurative, by extension) The final part of a distance or the final effort needed to finish.


varietal

/vəˈɹaɪətəl/

(by extension) A coffee made primarily from or exclusively from a single variety of coffee bean.


dishevelled

dishevelled (comparative more dishevelled, superlative most dishevelled)

more dishevelled (comparative)
most dishevelled (superlative)

From earlier dishevely, from Old French deschevelé (modern French déchevelé and échevelé), from des- (“dis-”), + chevel (“hair”) (modern French cheveu). See there for more details.

The men resided in a huge bunk house, which consisted of one room only, with a shack outside where the cooking was done. In the large room were a dozen bunks ; half of them in a very dishevelled state, […]

1913, Robert Barr, chapter 6, in Lord Stranleigh Abroad

This is a crazy, dishevelled, often hilarious film, in which lightning flashes of wit and insight crackle periodically across a plane of tedium. I sometimes felt I was watching the 100-hour version.

2018 August 31, Peter Bradshaw, “The Other Side of the Wind review – lost Orson Welles epic is hurricane of anger and wit”, in The Guardian

(by extension) Disorderly or untidy in appearance.


souped-up

souped-up (comparative more souped-up, superlative most souped-up)

more souped-up (comparative)
most souped-up (superlative)

Uncertain; the fact that the earlier senses seem to be the horse racing cant and United States Navy slang ones suggests a derivation from soup (“liquid food item”), connoting a horse or a person being filled with a liquid.
Alternatively, it has been suggested that the term is a modified clipping of supe(r), with reference to an aeroplane or automobile engine being supercharged: see, for example, the 1925 quotation. This sense appears to post-date the horse-racing and navy slang senses.

As with the previous Omicron subvariants, it seems likely that the US will follow those regions once again, with or without the new souped-up vaccines.

2022 July 20, “Opinion: Covid-19 continues to surprise us”, in CNN

Since its launch in November last year, ChatGPT has become an extraordinary hit. Essentially a souped-up chatbot, the AI program can churn out answers to the biggest and smallest questions in life, and draw up college essays, fictional stories, haikus, and even job application letters.

2023 January 13, Ian Sample, “ChatGPT: what can the extraordinary artificial intelligence chatbot do?”, in The Guardian, →ISSN


snarf

en-verb

snarf (third-person singular simple present snarfs, present participle snarfing, simple past and past participle snarfed)

snarfs (present singular third-person)
snarfing (participle present)
snarfed (participle past)
snarfed (past)

Probably of imitative origin. Alternatively, perhaps a blend of snack + scarf or snort + scarf. First attested in 1963.

onomatopoeic

imitative

Either write-through or write-back policy caches may snarf the data that the bus master is writing to memory.

1995, Tom Shanley, Don Anderson, ISA System Architecture, page 296

...in addition, the embedding enables the designer to snarf features from the underlying language […]

1996, Harold Abelson, Gerald Jay Sussman, Julie Sussman, Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs, page 399

2001: Brad A. Myers, Choon Hong Peck, Jeffrey Nicols, Dave Kong, and Robert Miller, Interacting at a Distance Using Semantic Snarfing, in Proceedings of the 3rd international conference on Ubiquitous Computing, pages 305-314.
Other future applications of the semantic snarfing idea might include classrooms, where students might snarf interesting pieces of content from the instructor's presentation; […]

(transitive, slang, computing, by extension) To fetch (in general).


gerrymander

en-verb

gerrymander (third-person singular simple present gerrymanders, present participle gerrymandering, simple past and past participle gerrymandered)

Elkanah Tisdale
Nathan Hale (journalist)
gerrymandering

gerrymanders (present singular third-person)
gerrymandering (participle present)
gerrymandered (participle past)
gerrymandered (past)

/ˈdʒɛɹiˌmændə/

/ˈd͡ʒɛɹiˌmændɚ/

Blend of Gerry + salamander (named after Elbridge Gerry), from the similarity in shape to a salamander of an electoral district created when Gerry was the governor of Massachusetts. Coined by editors of the Boston Gazette 26 March 1812, in text likely written by Nathan Hale and Benjamin and John Russell, and accompanying a cartoon by Elkanah Tisdale.

coin

The superintendent helped gerrymander the school district lines in order to keep the children of the wealthy gated community in the better school all the way across town.

(transitive, derogatory, by extension) To draw dividing lines for other types of districts in an unintuitive way to favor a particular group or for other perceived gain.

[The Reform Bill's] main purpose will be so to gerrymander the electorate as to give the greatest possible assistance to the Radical party at the next election.

1912, The Saturday Review of Politics, Literature, Science and Art

But Remainers often picture [Brexit] instead as the upshot of a poorly framed question put to an ill-informed, and underrepresentative segment of the population – even the product of a 'gerrymander'.

2018 November 1, Patrick Dunleavy, Alice Park, Ros Taylor, The UK's Changing Democracy: The 2018 Democratic Audit, LSE Press, page 257

Congress delegated to the first legislature the task of setting up elections under territorial law, which it did. But Montana Democrats couldn't pass up the opportunity to gerrymander the rules.

2021 October 29, Jeffrey S. Sutton, Who Decides?: States As Laboratories of Constitutional Experimentation, Oxford University Press, page 110

(transitive, derogatory, by extension) To change the franchise or voting system in such a way as to give an unfair advantage to one party in an election.

Westminster City Council has been accused by the District Auditor of using public money to gerrymander marginal wards for the 1990 Borough elections. The strategy of attempting to 'gentrify' eight key wards, selling off council homes and hostels for the homeless to move out potential Labour voters and attract in more Conservative voters, was in conflict with the council's statutory duty to homeless people

2000, Hugo de Burgh, Investigative Journalism: Context and Practice, Psychology Press, page 207

Fermanagh Council even went so far as to create the new village of Donagh in an attempt to move Catholics out of Newtownbutler, four miles away, so unionists could gerrymander a majority.

2022 December 1, Trevor Birney, Quinn, Merrion Press

(transitive, derogatory, by extension, chiefly UK and Ireland) To deliberately bring in voters of one's own party or displace voters of another party from a voting district in such a way as to give an unfair advantage to one party in an election.


clean bill of health

en-noun

clean bill of health (plural clean bills of health)

Now that we have changed the brake pads, the oil and the spark plugs, we can give this car a clean bill of health.

(figurative, by extension) A statement that indicates that there are no obvious problems.


solecism

Borrowed from French solécisme, from Latin soloecismus, from Ancient Greek σολοικισμός (soloikismós), from σόλοικος (sóloikos, “speaking incorrectly”), from Σόλοι (Sóloi), an ancient Athenian colony in Cilicia whose inhabitants spoke a dialect regarded by Athenians as a corrupted and barbarous form of Attic Greek. Compare Atticism.

1778, Fanny Burney, Evelina: Or the History of a Young Lady's Entrance into the World, Letter LXVIII: EVELINA TO THE REV. MR. VILLARS. Clifton, Sept. 28th.,
"Best young woman!" repeated Mr. Lovel; "'pon honour, Jack, you have made a most unfortunate speech; however, if Lady Louisa can pardon you,-and her Ladyship is all goodness,-I am sure nobody else can; for you have committed an outrageous solecism in good manners."

Under this plea, felons of the worst kind might claim, till this time, to be taken out of the hands of the law judges, and to be tried at the bishops’ tribunals; and at these tribunals, such a monstrous solecism had Catholicism become, the payment of money was ever welcomed as the ready expiation of crime.

1870, James Anthony Froude, chapter IV, in History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Defeat of the Spanish Armada, volume I

To build a church for the admiration of "the man in the street", who sees it from outside, or of the tourist who pays it a passing visit, or of the artist, or of anyone else whatsoever except that of the faithful who use the church for prayer, the hearing of Mass, and the reception of the sacraments, is to commit a solecism in the liturgy of all the material arts.

1913, “Ecclesiastical Architecture”, in Catholic Encyclopedia

(by extension) A faux pas or breach of etiquette; a transgression against the norms of expected behavior.


spotlight

(by extension) The circle of light shed by a spotlight.


fantasia

LL-Q1860 (eng)-I learned some phrases-fantasia.wav

Borrowed from Italian fantasia (“imagination, fancy, fantasy; musical composition with improvisational characteristics”), from Latin phantasia (“fancy, fantasy; imagination”), borrowed from Ancient Greek φᾰντᾰσῐ́ᾱ (phantasíā, “appearance, look; display, presentation; pageantry, pomp; impression, perception; image”), from φᾰ́ντᾰσῐς (phántasis) + -ῐ́ᾱ (-íā, suffix forming feminine abstract nouns). Φᾰ́ντᾰσῐς (Phántasis) is derived from φᾰντᾰ́ζω (phantázō, “to make visible, show; to become visible, appear; to imagine”), from φαίνω (phaínō, “to appear; to reveal; to shine”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeh₂- (“to shine”). The English word is a doublet of fancy, fantasy, phantasia, and phantasy.

doublet

It is, however, a ceremony of immense antiquity, and the chief civil festival of the year among the Arabs, who love nothing more dearly than a "phantasia" of this sort.

1872 October 19, “The Cutting of the Nile: From The Pall Mall Gazette”, in Littel’s Living Age, volume XXVII (Fourth Series; volume CXV overall), number 1480, Boston, Mass.: Littel & Gay, →OCLC, page 189, column 2

Consequently 'War in the Air' means social destruction instead of victory as the end of war. It not only alters the methods of war but the consequences of war. After all that has happened since this fantasia of possibility was written, I do not think that there is much wrong with this thesis.

[1921], H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, “Preface”, in The War in the Air (Collins’ Thin Paper Pocket Edition; 20), London, Glasgow: Collins Clear-Type Press, →OCLC; quoted in Charles E. Gannon, “Promoters of the Probable, Prophets of the Possible: Technological Innovation and Edwardian Near-future War Fiction”, in Rumors of War and Infernal Machines: Technomilitary Agenda-setting in American and British Speculative Fiction, Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2003, page 82

[The Warrior's Barrow (Kjæmpehøjen)] admirably conformed to his employers' National-Romantic aims. This is equally true of the four new plays with which [Henrik] Ibsen honoured his contract: St. John's Night) (Sancthansnatten, 1853), a phantasia having a good deal in common with [William] Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream [...]

1966, Brian W[esterdale] Downs, “Ibsen before 1884”, in Modern Norwegian Literature 1860–1918, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: University Press, published 2010, page 44

These are the years in which she [Ellen Terry] begins to sign her letters in a phantasia of different names.

1987, Nina Auerbach, “Our Lady of the Lyceum”, in Joan DeJean, Carroll Smith-Rosenberg, Peter Stallybrass, Gary Tomlinson, editors, Ellen Terry, Player in Her Time (New Cultural Studies), Philadelphia, Pa.: University of Pennsylvania Press, published 1997, page 209

Her art is always with her, clothing her from throat to toes in an indelible fantasia of color and form and myth.

2003, Ann K. Schwader, “Body of Work”, in Kevin L. O’Brien, editor, Strange Stars & Alien Shadows: The Dark Fiction of Ann K. Schwader, Aurora, Colo.: Lindisfarne Press, page 39

David and my parents looked up from passing bowls of potato and chicken salad. Great, a mayonnaise fantasia.

2012, Zoe Fishman, chapter 2, in Saving Ruth, New York, N.Y.: William Morrow

[T]he zippy musical numbers in which Mary Poppins (a stiff-lipped Emily Blunt) whisks cherubs Annabel, John, and Georgie (Pixie Davies, Nathanael Saleh, and Joel Dawson, respectively) away into colorful hyperreal fantasias impress.

2018 December 12, Charles Bramesco, “A Spoonful of Nostalgia Helps the Calculated Mary Poppins Returns Go Down”, in The A.V. Club, archived from the original on 2019-05-24

(chiefly art, by extension) Any work which is unstructured or comprises other works of different genres or styles.


watermark

/ˈwɔːtəmɑːk/

(by extension) A logo superimposed on a digital image, a television broadcast, etc.


staunch

en-adj

staunch (comparative stauncher, superlative staunchest)

stauncher (comparative)
staunchest (superlative)

From Middle English staunch, staunche (“(adjective) in good condition or repair; solidly made, firm; watertight; of a person or wound: not bleeding; certain; intact; (adverb) firmly, soundly”) [and other forms], from Anglo-Norman estaunche, Old French estanche (“firm; watertight”) (modern French étanche (“airtight; watertight”)), a variant of estanc (“a pond”), from estanchier (“to stop the flow of a liquid (blood, water, etc.); to make (something) watertight; to quench (thirst)”) (modern French étancher), possibly from one of the following:
* From Vulgar Latin *stagnicāre, from Latin stāgnum (“piece of standing water, pond; fen, swamp”), possibly from Proto-Indo-European *steh₂g- (“to drip; to seep”).
* From Vulgar Latin *stānticāre, from *stānticus (“tired”), from Latin stāns, stāntis (“standing; remaining, staying”). Stāns is the present active participle of stō (“to stand; to remain, stay”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *steh₂- (“to stand (up)”).
cognates
* Italian stanco (“bored; tired”)
* Portuguese estanque (“watertight”)
* Romansch staunza (“a room”)
* Spanish estanco (“closed, sealed; airtight; watertight”)

верен

dependable, loyal, reliable, trustworthy — see also dependable, loyal, reliable, trustworthy

Not permitting water or some other liquid to escape or penetrate; watertight.

(by extension) Impermeable to air or other gases; airtight.


demimonde

Virginia Oldoini, Countess of Castiglione

Borrowed from French demi-monde (literally “half-world”), from demi (“half”) + monde (“world; people”); possibly coined by French author and playwright Alexandre Dumas fils as the title of a comedic play, Le Demi Monde (1855): see the 1864 quotation.

refn

From the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, New York, USA.

bor

the literary demimonde

It's fascinating to hear, for example, how an addict and charming scoundrel named Herbert Huncke — the man who became a key emissary from the drug demimonde for Burroughs, Ginsberg and Kerouac — had himself been drawn to heroin by tales of Shanghai opium dens, “posh layouts with cushions on the floor and naked or half-naked men and women laying about,” as he tells Torgoff.

2004 June 6, Hal Espen, “Higher and Higher”, in The New York Times, →ISSN

In the midst of these discussions over foreign realisms, a group of novels appeared that pointed up the contradictions that beset the regime's projects for a national literature and a fascist style of modernity. Written by intellectuals in their twenties, these novels sparked much debate for their frank depictions of bourgeois moral corruption. […] In fact, the young protagonists of these works hardly fit the description of the regime's "new men," and the cosmopolitan demimondes they frequent had been targeted by fascist zealots for rehabilitation.

2004, Ruth Ben-Ghiat, “Narrating the Nation”, in Fascist Modernities: Italy, 1922–1945, 1st paperback edition, Berkeley, Los Angeles, Calif., London: University of California Press, page 55

Through a series of ethnicized disciplinary institutions—factory, family—shopfloor workers and their relatives and friends working at home are drawn into an ethnic demimonde of docile labor.

2006, Aihwa Ong, “Latitudes, or How Markets Stretch the Bounds of Governmentality”, in Neoliberalism as Exception: Mutations in Citizenship and Sovereignty, Durham, N.C., London: Duke University Press, part III (Circuits of Expertise), page 129

(by extension) A group having little respect or reputation.

Halbwelt

Those who seek pleasure in a round of dances and fashionable frolic, where the german and the horse-race, the card-table and the drive, are the order of the day, will gather to the sea side and the spa; they will seek Newport, the maelstrom of money; or Long Branch with its broiling sun and its retinue of demimondes and stuck-up-ities; […]

1869 June, “Summer Recreations”, in W. W. Hall, editor, Hall’s Journal of Health, volume XVI, number VI, New York, N.Y.: W. W. Hall, publisher, […], →OCLC, page 119

I was called to see B. J., a demimonde and opium habitue, and found her suffering intensely with pain over the right upper chest, neck and arm, and numbness in the right little finger and one-half of the ring finger. […] Diagnosis—brachialgia following traumatism.

1898 February, G. G. Buford, “Brachialgia”, in R. B. Maury et al., editors, The Memphis Lancet, volume I, number 5, Memphis, Tenn.: S. C. Toof & Co., printers, published November 1898, →OCLC, page 277

On the evening of 4 August 1914 London's Café Royal was alive with its usual array of demimondes, dandies, aristocrats, émigrés, and self-styled bohemians.

2010, Michael J. K. Walsh, “Introduction: Avant-garde and Avant-guerre”, in Michael J. K. Walsh, editor, London, Modernism, and 1914, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, page 1

While on the one hand remaining deeply enmeshed in the cultural stirrings in their own communities, the era's literary demimondes also conceived of themselves as crucial social agents who would chart the New Left's progress, champion its goals, […]

2011, John [Campbell] McMillian, “‘All the Protest Fit to Print’: The Rise of Liberation News Service”, in Smoking Typewriters: The Sixties Underground Press and the Rise of Alternative Media in America, New York, N.Y.: Oxford University Press, page 82

(by extension) A member of such a class or group of persons.


wallet

From Middle English walet (“bag, knapsack”), of uncertain origin. Possibly from an assumed Old Northern French *walet (“roll; bag; knapsack”), from Proto-Germanic *wal- (“to roll”). More at walk, well, wallow.

der

It's unknown if the pro running back's recent sex scandal will hit him in the wallet or not.

(by extension, informal) A person's bank account or assets.


well-bred

en-adj

well-bred (comparative better-bred or more well-bred, superlative best-bred or most well-bred)

better-bred (comparative)
more well-bred (comparative)
best-bred (superlative)
most well-bred (superlative)

Ideally you should relax—though well-bred English people do no feel entirely at ease in a room full of naked strangers beating one another.

1986, Marc Polonsky, Russell Taylor, USSR, From an Original Idea by Karl Marx, Faber and Faber

(by extension) Well-mannered and refined because of a good upbringing and education.


well-worn

well-worn (comparative more well-worn, superlative most well-worn)

more well-worn (comparative)
most well-worn (superlative)

The decay of social norms and status quo systems triggering an authoritarian tightening of the screws is a well-worn pattern throughout human history.

2023 August 28, Charles Hugh Smith, Neither Comply Nor Resist

(by extension) trite or hackneyed; repeated too often


instar

From Latin instar (“form, likeness”), which is of obscure origin.

California spirituality is a late instar of America’s utopian impulse, and corporate meritocracy derives from the Whig dream of the self-made man that entranced young Abraham Lincoln.

2014 January 8, Caleb Crain, “The Democratic Personality”, in The New Yorker


freestyle

en-noun

freestyle (countable and uncountable, plural freestyles)

freestyle

(sports) A sports event where competitors can choose their own method of participation.

(swimming) A swimming event in which the contestants may choose any stroke.

(swimming, by extension) The swimming stroke commonly referred to as the front crawl or the Australian crawl.

cross-country skiing
cross-country skiing

(skiing) A cross-country skiing event in which the competitors may choose any style of skiing.

(skiing, by extension) The skiing style commonly referred to as skating.

(While there are definitely a large number of Japanese cookbooks out there with detailed instructions and measurements, it was this freestyle cooking philosophy I most frequently encountered.)

2012, Sarah Marx Feldner, A Cook's Journey to Japan: 100 Homestyle Recipes from Japanese Kitchens, Tuttle Publishing

(by extension, attributive) Anything done in an improvised or unrestricted way.


dangle

en-verb

dangle (third-person singular simple present dangles, present participle dangling, simple past and past participle dangled)

dangles (present singular third-person)
dangling (participle present)
dangled (participle past)
dangled (past)

Uncertain, but likely of North Germanic origin, akin to Danish dingle, dangle, Swedish dangla (“to swing about”), Norwegian dangla, perhaps via North Frisian dangeln; all possibly related to Old Norse dengja (“to hit”).

That it happens to have been produced under the imprimatur of Michael Bay dangles the possibility of poor taste, but unfortunately, bombast and conspicuous consumption are nowhere to be found.

2020 December 10, Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, “The first movie inspired by the pandemic is here, and it sucks”, in The Onion AV Club

(transitive, figurative, by extension) To put forth as a possibility.


verdure

en-noun

verdure (countable and uncountable, plural verdures)

-ɜː(ɹ)dʒə(ɹ)

From Middle English verdure, from Old French verdure.

(by extension) A condition of health and vigour.


runt

The OED classifies this word as "of obscure origin". Some see a connection to Middle Dutch runt (“ox”), but the OED considers this to be unlikely.

unk

obscure

the runt of the family

(by extension) The smallest child in the family.


crack whore

(vulgar, slang, derogatory, by extension) Any sexually promiscuous or adulterous woman.


big top

(by extension) A large tent of the style used for circusses.

He had been a big top performer in his youth, but in a twist of fate he had run away to become an investment banker.

(by extension) The circus; the circus lifestyle.


virgin territory

en-noun

virgin territory (usually uncountable, plural virgin territories)

The company had engineered plenty of products, but manufacturing them was virgin territory.

(figurative, by extension) Ideas or concepts or activities that have not yet been tried, explored or developed.


fence in

en-verb

fence in (third-person singular simple present fences in, present participle fencing in, simple past and past participle fenced in)

fences in (present singular third-person)
fencing in (participle present)
fenced in (participle past)
fenced in (past)

Many people feel fenced in by the new rules.

(idiomatic, by extension) To restrict freedom.


cottage industry

en-noun

cottage industry (plural cottage industries)

Customers quickly sensed the change when CA took over a company: The new owners vigorously enforced license agreements, often in the courts. A cottage industry soon sprang up to advise companies on how to negotiate with CA.

1996 November 11, Amy Cortese, “Computer Associates: Sexy? No. Profitable? You Bet”, in BusinessWeek, archived from the original on 2000-06-09

So why was there so much breathlessness about a blogger joining this emphatically non-exclusive club? Because the blogging story has become a cottage industry, a cultural fashion trend that blogger and establishment alike have a vested interest in keeping alive.

2005 March, William Powers, “Sleeping With the Enemy”, in The Atlantic

Microfinance, once a relative cottage industry championed by antipoverty activists and development wonks, is on the verge of a revolution, with billions of dollars from big banks, private-equity shops and pension funds pouring in.

2008 June 5, Barbara Kiviat, “The Big Trouble In Small Loans”, in Time, archived from the original on 2011-02-09

Remote and difficult to access, many villages in China’s interior have developed a criminal cottage industry, involving anything from drugs to internet fraud to counterfeiting.

2017 April, Robert Foyle Hunwick, “Big in China: Murder Villages and Scam Towns”, in The Atlantic

(by extension) A small-scale industry, with relatively few employees or a limited customer base or low economic impact.


outlandish

en-adj

outlandish (comparative more outlandish, superlative most outlandish)

more outlandish (comparative)
most outlandish (superlative)

/ˌæɔtˈlændɪʃ/

The adjective is derived from Middle English outlandisch, outlondish (“foreign”), from Old English ūtlendisċ (“foreign; strange, outlandish”), from Proto-West Germanic *ūtlandisk, from Proto-Germanic *ūtlandiskaz, from *ūtlandą (“(adjective) alien, foreign; relating to outlying land; (noun) foreign land; outlying land”) + *-iskaz (suffix forming adjectives from nouns with the sense ‘characteristic of; pertaining to’). *Ūtlandą is derived from *ūt- (suffix meaning ‘beyond; external to, on the outside of’) (from Proto-Indo-European *úd (“away; out, outward; upwards”)) + *landą (“area of ground, land”) (from Proto-Indo-European *lendʰ- (“heath; land”)). By surface analysis, outland + -ish. The noun is derived from the adjective.
cognates
* Danish udenlandsk (“foreign, non-domestic”)
* Dutch uitlands (dated) (now buitenlands (“foreign, non-domestic”)), Dutch uitlandig (“absent from the home country”) (now chiefly Suriname)
* Faroese útlendskur (“foreign, non-domestic”)
* German ausländisch (“foreign, non-domestic”)
* Icelandic útlenskur (“foreign”)
* Swedish utländsk (“foreign, non-domestic”)

cog

Appearing to be foreign; strange, unfamiliar.

The rock star wore black with outlandish pink and green spiked hair.

Except for an eye-catching sky-blue container boldly and attractively featuring the B.T.C.'s "door-to-door" arrow symbol[…], there were no outlandish colour schemes or lettering styles.

1961 July, “Talking of Trains: The Marylebone Exhibition”, in Trains Illustrated, London: Ian Allan Publishing, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 388

I hardly need to add that this story requires outlandish assumptions to make investment behaviour more passive than one would expect it to be in an industrial capitalist economy.

1969 (date delivered), R[obert] M[erton] Solow, “Characteristics of Steady States”, in Growth Theory: An Exposition […], London: Clarendon Press, published 1970, →OCLC, page 13

Greatly different from common experience; bizarre, outrageous, strange.

vreemd

greatly different from common experience — see also bizarre, outrageous, strange

(derogatory) Of a place: far away from where most people are located; in the middle of nowhere, out of the way, remote.


terra incognita

Borrowed from Latin terra incognita (“unknown land”).

bor+

The concept of the unconscious or an inner terra incognita, an unknown country of the psyche that precedes and predicates the Cartesian subject, the focal point of rational consciousness, was a revolutionary idea.

2009, Gary Clark, Quadrant, November 2009, No. 461 (Volume LIII, Number 11), Quadrant Magazine Limited, page 9

How commonly stinging insects encounter this problem is scientific terra incognita.

2016, Justin O. Schmidt, The Sting of the Wild, Johns Hopkins University Press, page 18

(by extension) Ideas or concepts that have not yet been tried or explored.


on the wagon

Originally on the water wagon or on the water cart, referring to carts used to hose down dusty roads: see the 1901 quotation below. The suggestion is that a person who is “on the wagon” is drinking water rather than alcoholic beverages. The term may have been used by the early 20th-century temperance movement in the United States; for instance, William Hamilton Anderson (1874 – c. 1959), the superintendent of the New York Anti-Saloon League, is said to have made the following remark about Prohibition: “Be a good sport about it. No more falling off the water wagon. Uncle Sam will help you keep your pledge.”

He’s been on the smoking cessation wagon for two weeks now.

This book is about harm reduction. It is not about "getting clean." […] It is not about an all-or-nothing attitude: drink or be on the wagon, use or quit. It is about reducing the harm done by alcohol and other drugs in your life. Less harm is the solution.

2003, Patt Denning, Jeannie Little, Adina Glickman, “Addiction: Is It All or Nothing?”, in Over the Influence: The Harm Reduction Guide for Managing Drugs and Alcohol, New York, N.Y.: Guilford Press, page 15

Just because you've had a smoke doesn't mean that you need to become depressed and give up on quitting. This is a learning process and you need to take every day as it comes. Simply get back on the wagon and continue on with your nonsmoking goals. You can do this!

2015, Richard Foreman, “Managing Your Cravings”, in How to Quit Smoking in Simple Steps!: The Best Easy Ways to Stop Smoking, [s.l.]: Richard Foreman

(by extension) Maintaining a program of self-improvement or abstinence from some other undesirable habit.


persuasion

en-noun

persuasion (countable and uncountable, plural persuasions)

From French persuasion and its source, Latin persuāsiō, from persuādēre, from suādēre (“to advise, recommend”).

overtuiging

a sort, type, or kind with respect to convictions and beliefs

1871 February 14, J.J., "More Solution", Latter-Day Saints Millennial Star, page 105.
Let us pray that the next generation be all of the male persuasion.

To say that a woman is of the female persuasion was originally meant for a joke. As such it might pass — once. You might, indeed, refuse to smile; still, you wouldn't feel like invoking the law. But the constant and persistent use of this unfunny bit of fun has frown to be something of a public calamity. It is matter or congratulation, however, that such linguistic lese-majesty is far more common in England than in America.

1890, The Illustrated American, volume 4, page 308

AND turning for tor the moment from National to local affairs, we note there is a chimpanzee of the female persuasion out at Lincoln Park, of whom it is said that she can do everything but talk.

1919, Pere Marquette Magazine, volume 11, page 19

This plainly implies that an equine animal either is of the feminine gender or is of the neuter persuasion.

1967, Taxes. The Tax Magazine, volume 45, number 2, page 698

Being a discussion between a Swede and an Australian of the medical persuasion, conversation turned to Pehr Edman who, as a Swedish expatriate, spent many years in Australia heading up the School of Medical Research at St Vincent's Hospital.

1984, The Medical Journal of Australia, page 739

The moonlight was bright this night; playing the part of a miniature sun as it reflected off the white faces of the Caucasian troops, but failing to reveal those of the darker persuasion. "One thing, Charlie can see them better than he can see me."

2005, Lawrence Thomason, All the Sparks Fly Up!, page 78

She searched for something to say, something other than, So will this New Year's kiss be of the French persuasion?, and then found herself mumbling, “Vive la France.”

2015, Leslie Kelly, “No More Bad Girls”, in New Year's Resolution: Romance!: Say Yes\No More Bad Girls\Just a Fling, Harlequin, page 125

(by extension, often humorous) Another personal, animal or inanimate trait that is not (very) liable to be changed by persuasion, such as sex, gender, ethnicity, origin, profession or nature.

hovatartozás

(by extension, often humorously) another personal, animal or inanimate trait that is not (very) liable to be changed by persuasion, such as sex, gender, ethnicity, origin, profession or nature


fratricide

fratricide (countable and uncountable, plural fratricides)

From Middle French fratricide or its etymon Latin frātricīdium.

From January on, Third Army also spent a good deal of energy trying to solve the problem of fratricide, the killing or injuring of one's own forces by what is ironically called 'friendly fire,'[…]

1999, Richard M. Swain, Lucky War: Third Army in Desert Storm, DIANE Publishing, page 180

Such a press of arms invites many opportunities for unintentional fratricide.

2007 September 25, Bungie, Halo 3, Microsoft Game Studios, Xbox 360, level/area: Terminal Six (Legendary)

(military, by extension) The intentional or unintentional killing of a comrade in arms.

(military, by extension) The undesirable situation where the separate missiles from a MIRV interfere with each other as they explode.


pass the parcel

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-pass the parcel.wav

(by extension) a situation in which the ownership of something changes frequently.


coxcomb

Thanks to my stars, I once can see / A window here from scribbling free! / Here no conceited coxcombs pass, / To scratch their paltry drabs on glass; / Nor party-fool is calling names, / Or dealing crowns to George and James.

a. 1746, Jonathan Swift, “VII. Another, Written upon a Window where there was No Writing before.”, in Thomas Sheridan, compiler, The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, D.D., Dean of St. Patrick’s, Dublin. […] In Nineteen Volumes, new corrected and revised edition, volume VII, London: Printed [by Nichols and Son] for J[oseph] Johnson [et al.], published 1801, →OCLC, page 361

And she nearly started a fight between two young fops in plumed hats and flouncy collars: "Clay-brained coxcomb!" "Mewling milk-livered maggot!"

2010, Pseudonymous Bosch, This Isn't What It Looks Like

(by extension) A foolish or conceited person; a dandy.


whiff

The noun is possibly:
* partly a variant of Middle English wef, weffe (“bad smell, stench, stink; exhalation; vapour; tendency of something to go bad (?)”) [and other forms], possibly a variant of either:
** waf, waif, waife (“odour, scent”), possibly from waven (“to move to and fro, sway, wave; to stray, wander; to move in a weaving manner; (figuratively) to hesitate, vacillate”), from Old English wafian (“to wave”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *webʰ- (“to braid, weave”); or
** wef (“a blow, stroke”), from weven (“to travel, wander; to move to and fro, flutter, waver; to blow something away, waft; to cause something to move; to fall; to cut deeply; to sever; to give up, yield; to give deference to; to avoid; to afflict, trouble; to beckon, signal”); further etymology uncertain, perhaps from Old English wefan (“to weave”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *webʰ- (“to braid, weave”)), or from wǣfan (see bewǣfan, ymbwǣfan); and
* partly onomatopoeic.
Noun sense 6 (“name of a number of flatfish”) is possibly derived from sense 1 (“brief, gentle breeze; a light gust of air”), sense 4 (“small quantity of cloud, smoke, vapour, etc.”), and other such senses.
The verb and adjective are derived from the noun. Verb sense 2.6 (“to catch fish by dragging a handline near the surface of the water from a moving boat”) is possibly derived from sense 1.1 (“to carry or convey (something) by, or as by, a whiff or puff of air”), sense 2.2 (“to be carried, or move as if carried, by a puff of air”), and other such senses.
The interjection is derived from noun sense 7.4 (“a sound like that of air passing through a small opening; a short or soft whistle”).

дъх

A short inhalation or exhalation of breath, especially when accompanied by smoke from a cigarette or pipe.

(by extension, archaic) A cigarette or small cigar.


whiff

en-verb

whiff (third-person singular simple present whiffs, present participle whiffing, simple past and past participle whiffed)

whiffs (present singular third-person)
whiffing (participle present)
whiffed (participle past)
whiffed (past)

Or consider an alternative [imaginary] exhibit, in some side gallery, that sadly reflects on an enormous lost opportunity. […] This is a dark, dead end in the Biden library: A once mighty nation is served its toughest challenge yet, and it whiffs.

2021 June 30, Farhad Manjoo, “Democrats have a year to save the planet”, in The New York Times, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2021-06-30

(intransitive)
(slang)
(by extension) To fail spectacularly.


shire

→ Icelandic: skíri

The noun is derived from Middle English shire (“district, province, region; county; people living in a county or region; township or subdivision of some English counties; shire court; session of a shire court”) [and other forms], from Old English sċīr (“administrative region under an alderman and sheriff, shire; district under a governor or official; status of an official, office”) [and other forms], from Proto-West Germanic *skīru (“district; status of an official, office”); further etymology uncertain, possibly related to Latin cūra (“care, concern; administration, charge, management; command, office”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *kʷeys- (“to heed; to see”).
The verb is derived from the noun.

nb...

chyer, schere, schire, schyr, schyre, scīr, sheere, sher, shir, shyr, shyre, sir, ssire

inh

(by extension) The people living in a shire (sense 1.1) considered collectively.

kreivikunta

people living in a shire considered collectively

When are you coming back to the shire?

(by extension, informal) The general area in which a person comes from or lives.

kotiseutu

(by extension) An administrative area or district in other countries.

(Australia, often attributive) An outer suburban or rural local government area which elects its own council.

郡

(Australia) outer suburban or rural local government area which elects its own council

(by extension, generally) A region; also, a country.


wet nurse

(figuratively, by extension) Someone who treats someone else with excessive care.

ня́нька

someone who treats someone else with excessive care


wilderness

en-noun

wilderness (countable and uncountable, plural wildernesses)

From Middle English wildernes, wildernesse (“uninhabited, uncultivated, or wild territory; desolate land; desert; (figuratively) depopulated or devastated place; state of devastation or ruin; human experience and life”) [and other forms], and then either:
* from Middle English wilderne (“deserted or uninhabited place, wilderness; land not yet settled”) [and other forms] (from Old English wilddeōren (“savage, wild”); see below) + -nes, -nesse (suffix forming abstract nouns denoting qualities or states); or
* from Old English *wildēornes, *wilddēornes, probably from wilddēor (“wild animal”) [and other forms] or more likely from wilddēoren (“savage, wild”) (from wilddēor + -en (suffix forming adjectives with the sense ‘consisting of; material made of’)) + -nes (suffix forming abstract nouns denoting qualities or states).
Wilddēor is derived from wilde (“savage, wild”) (ultimately either from Proto-Indo-European *wel-, *welw- (“hair, wool; ear of corn, grass; forest”), or *gʷʰel- (“wild”)) + dēor (“beast, wild animal”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *dʰwes- (“to breathe; breath; soul, spirit; creature”)).
The English word is cognate with Danish vildnis (“wilderness”), German Wildernis, Wildnis (“wilderness”), Middle Dutch wildernisse (“wilderness”) (modern Dutch wildernis (“wilderness”)), Middle Low German wildernisse (“wilderness”) (German Low German Wildernis (“wilderness”)), Saterland Frisian Wüüldernis (“wilderness”), West Frisian wyldernis (“wilderness”).
Sense 3.3 (“situation of disfavour or lack of recognition”) is a reference to Numbers 14:32–33 in the Bible (King James Version; spelling modernized): “But as for you, your carcasses, they shall fall in this wilderness. And your children shall wander in the wilderness forty years, and bear your whoredoms, until your carcasses be wasted in the wilderness.”

nb...

wildernese, wildernise, wildernosse, wildirnes, wilirnesse, wildirenes, wildurnes, wildurnesse, wildrenes, wildrenesse, wyldernesse, wyldernys

nb...

(Northern England or Northwest Midlands) wildernes, wildrenes, (Southwest Midlands) wulderne, (Early Middle English) wildren

cog

(countable) A place other than land (for example, the air or sea) that is uncared for, and therefore devoted to disorder or wildness.

(countable, horticulture) An ornamental part of a garden or park cultivated with trees and often a maze to evoke a natural wilderness.

(uncountable, obsolete) Unrefinedness; wildness.


hulk

From Middle English hulk, hulke, holke (“hut; shed for hogs; type of ship; husk, pod, shell; large, clumsy person; a giant”) (probably reinforced by
From Middle Dutch hulk, huelc, and Middle Low German hulk, holk, hollek (“freighter, cargo ship, barge”)), from Old English hulc (“light ship; heavy, clumsy ship; cabin, hovel, hut”), from Proto-West Germanic *huluk, *hulik, from Proto-Germanic *hulukaz, *hulikaz (“something hollowed or dug out, cavity”), equivalent to hole/hollow + -ock. Cognate with Old High German holcho (“cargo or transport ship, barge”) (whence Middle High German holche, modern German Holk), Old Norse hólkr (“metal tube, ring”), dialectal Norwegian holk, hylke (“wooden barrel”), Middle English holken (“to dig out, gouge”).
Relation to Medieval Latin hulcus (“ship”) is uncertain, as Old English may have borrowed from Latin or vice versa, but the form holcas rather points to borrowing from Ancient Greek ὁλκάς (holkás, “ship being towed; cargo ship, ship used for trading, holcad”) (compare
Ancient Greek ἕλκω (hélkō, “to drag”), possibly from Proto-Indo-European *selk- (“to draw, pull”)). See more at the Old English entry hulc.
The verb is derived from the noun.

cog

A sister ship, originally the Patriotic, and later renamed Lady Leinster and finally the Lady Connaught, was badly damaged by a mine between Liverpool and Belfast; the British & Irish Steam Packet Company next brought [sic] the hulk back from the Belfast Steamship Company and converted her into a livestock carrier.

1946 March and April, “Notes and News: Anglo-Irish Steamship Fleets”, in Railway Magazine, page 118

(by extension) A non-functional but floating ship, usually stripped of equipment and rigging, and often put to other uses such as accommodation or storage.


house of cards

The essentials of megalithic construction are either the single large slab or the large slab as walling stone with another large slab resting on two or more large walling stones as a capstone—a sort of house of cards architecture.

1958, Glyn Edmund Daniel, The Megalith Builders of Western Europe, page 18

Dolmens impress only by their massiveness: their house-of-cards construction is the simplest possible […]

1977, Lionel Casson, Joseph Jacobs Thorndike, Mysteries of the past, page 49

Also, it has been proposed that lithium ions can be adsorbed on both sides of the graphene sheets that are aggregated disorderly into a “house of cards” architecture, leading to two layers of lithium for each graphene sheet […]

2017, Markus Antonietti, Klaus Müllen, Chemical Synthesis and Applications of Graphene and Carbon Materials

(by extension, often attributive) Any structure with alternating vertical and horizontal layers.


cruiser

(nautical) A class of fast warships of medium tonnage, having a long cruising range but less armour and firepower than a battleship.

(science fiction, by extension) A starship of comparable role


wine cellar

From Middle English wyn celer, wyne saler.


purdah

en-noun

purdah (countable and uncountable, plural purdahs)

Borrowed from Hindustani پردہ / पर्दा (pardā), and its etymon Classical Persian پرده (pardah, “curtain; screen; (archaic) veil”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *pleh₂- (“flat”).

der

(countable) A long veil or other attire covering most of the body, worn by women in some Muslim societies.

purdah

(uncountable) The situation or system of secluding women from the gaze of people, particularly men and strangers, in some Muslim and Hindu traditions, by using a curtain or screen, and/or wearing a face veil or attire covering most of the body.

পর্দা

situation or system of secluding women from the gaze of people in some Muslim and Hindu traditions

Still, though the lettrist movement was not casual—members might be fined, put in purdah, or even expelled for malingering—aesthetic pluralism remained in effect.

1989, Greil Marcus, “Version 2: A Secret History of a Time that Passed”, in Lipstick Traces: A Secret History of the Twentieth Century, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, page 277

(uncountable, figuratively) Keeping apart; isolation, seclusion; also, concealment, secrecy.

Despite Rail Minister Chris Heaton-Harris's reassurance that "the White Paper is coming" it was further delayed by the period of purdah that preceded local elections held on May 6.

2021 June 2, “Network News: ‘Root and Branch’ Review Three Years in the Making”, in Rail, number 932, Peterborough, Cambridgeshire: Bauer Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 10

(countable, UK politics) The period between the announcement of an election or referendum and its conclusion, during which civil servants refrain from making policy announcements or taking actions that could be seen as advantageous to certain candidates in the election.

පර්ඩර්

(uncountable, obsolete, rare) A striped cotton cloth which is used to make curtains.


titanic

en-adj

titanic (not generally comparable, comparative more titanic, superlative most titanic)

more titanic (comparative)
most titanic (superlative)

(comparable) Having great size, or great force, power, or strength.

(not comparable) Of a conflict or contest: involving equally powerful participants.


matter of fact

See matter, fact. First attested in the 16th century.

It’s a matter of fact that I came into work yesterday.

And all that I pretend to in this ensueing Treatise, is only to poynt with the finger from the Text unto the mater of fact, shewing how here & there, these & those words of the Text were fulfilled.

1690, John Butler, Bellua Marina: or the Monstrous Beast Which Arose out of the Sea […], page 3

(by extension) A point of fact; a claim or statement about (empirical) facts, as opposed to conjecture or opinion.


dead air

(idiomatic, by extension) A quiet or awkward moment in a conversation where neither speaker is talking.


sticker

From stick (“to pierce, to be fastened, to adhere”) + -er (“agent”).

affix

When buying a car, know the sticker and the invoice price.

(by extension) The listed price (also sticker price).


upstage

en-verb

upstage (third-person singular simple present upstages, present participle upstaging, simple past and past participle upstaged)

upstages (present singular third-person)
upstaging (participle present)
upstaged (participle past)
upstaged (past)

From up- + stage. The figurative uses “haughty” and “to draw attention away” derive from actors moving to a higher and thus more visible position on a sloped stage.

(transitive, by extension) To treat snobbishly.


ditto

First attested in 1625. From regional Italian ditto, variant of detto, past participle of dire (“to say”), from Latin dīcō (“I say, I speak”). Not related to English dittography or Italian dito (“finger”).
The specific meaning of making copies of paper comes from ditto machine, the brand name of a spirit duplicator.

"You've got to look good to feel good," she announces, a ditto of television slogans.

1991, N. Romano-Benner with S. Murphy, “Convoking the muses of Cuenca”, in Americas, volume 43, number 1, page 6

Last year, Argenta-Oreana blanked the Chiefs 23-0 in a second-round game Dee-Mack coach Jim McDonald said was "pretty much a ditto" of what transpired Saturday.

2003 November 9, “Argenta appears unfazed”, in Herald & Review

The intent of the policy, she said, is "not to put everybody in a ditto environment," where all are expected to look and act exactly like all others.

2009 May 6, “Brunswick school hopes to be model for uniforms”, in Myrtle Beach Sun News


shaft

From Middle English schaft, from Old English sċeaft, from Proto-West Germanic *skaft, from Proto-Germanic *skaftaz. Cognate with Dutch schacht, German German Schaft, Swedish skaft.

And the thunder, / Winged with red lightning and impetuous rage, / Perhaps hath spent his shafts.

Some kinds of literary pursuits […] have been attacked with all the shafts of ridicule.

(by extension) Anything cast or thrown as a spear or javelin.


vinyl record

(by extension) A gramophone record made from any material.


wrangle

wrangle (third-person singular simple present wrangles, present participle wrangling, simple past and past participle wrangled)

wrangles (present singular third-person)
wrangling (participle present)
wrangled (participle past)
wrangled (past)
wrangle (infinitive)

The verb is derived from Middle English wranglen, wrangle (“to contend with (someone) in a test of strength; (figuratively) to make misleading arguments to entrap”); from a Middle Dutch or Middle Low German word related to Middle Dutch wrangen and Middle Low German wrangen (“to cause an uproar; to struggle, wrestle”) (whence Low German wrangeln (“to wrangle”)), related to Middle Dutch wringen (“to twist; to wrest; to wring; to struggle, wrestle”), ultimately from Proto-Germanic *wringaną (“to squeeze; to twist; to wring”).
The noun is derived from the verb.
cognates
* Danish vringle (“to twist, entangle”)
* German rangeln (“to wrestle”)

рабптя като каубой

to herd (horses or other livestock); to manage or supervise (people)

Wrangling a chaotic group of five-year-olds is unnerving enough without the added stress of a famous NHLer [Brian Gionta] in the room helping lace his son’s skates.

2010 October 3, Sean Gordon, “Gionta settles in, stands out”, in The Globe and Mail, Toronto, Ont.: The Globe and Mail Inc., →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2021-06-15

(Western US) To herd (horses or other livestock).

(by extension, humorous) To manage or supervise (people).

To herd (horses or other livestock).
To manage or supervise (people).


vibration

en-noun

vibration (countable and uncountable, plural vibrations)

From French vibration, from Latin vibrātiō (“a shaking or brandishing”), from vibrō (“shake, vibrate”); see vibrate.
Morphologically vibrate + -ion

der

I'm pickin' up good vibrations / She's giving me the excitations.

1966, Mike Love, Brian Wilson (lyrics and music), “Good Vibrations”, performed by The Beach Boys

The procession circled the district, symbolically purging the area of its “evil,” which paraders described as the “bad vibrations” from tourists and youths in Hippie clothes not living up to Hippie standards.

1967 October 7, “Parade in Haight-Ashbury Marks ‘Death of the Hippie’”, in New York Times, page 26

(by extension, slang, often in the plural) An instinctively sensed emotional aura or atmosphere.


vote of confidence

en-noun

vote of confidence (plural votes of confidence)

"I don't find you unduly piggish," she said.
"Wow," I said. "Thanks for the vote of confidence."

2006, Robert B. Parker, Hundred-Dollar Baby, Putnam, page 44

(informal, by extension) Any indication of confidence in another.


sinner

From Middle English synnere, equivalent to sin + -er. Compare Saterland Frisian Säänder (“sinner”), West Frisian sûnder (“sinner”), Dutch zondaar (“sinner”), German Low German Sünder, Sünner (“sinner”), German Sünder (“sinner”), Danish synder (“sinner”), Swedish syndare (“sinner”), Icelandic syndari (“sinner”).

fasiq

one who has sinned by violating Islamic law

(figuratively, by extension) A person with negative qualities; one who does bad things.

Are you a sinner or a saint?

One who lives a hedonist life; a self-indulgent person.


ground zero

ground zero (countable and uncountable, plural ground zeroes)

/ˌɡɹaʊnd ˈzɪəɹəʊ/

/ˌɡɹaʊnd ˈzɪɚ(ˌ)oʊ/

From ground + zero, first attested in a June 1946 a report by the United States Strategic Bombing Survey on the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, on August 6 and 9, 1945, during World War II. “Zero” was used as the code name for the location of the Trinity atomic bomb test – the first detonation of a nuclear weapon – in New Mexico, USA, on July 16, 1945.

"This is ground zero," she said. "If regulators don't adopt a zero tolerance for violations of standards then what we will have are places that are going to have unacceptable environmental damage."

2011 April 21, Suzanne Goldenberg, quoting Jan Jarrett, “Pennsylvania: the ‘ground zero’ of the US shale gas drilling boom”, in The Guardian

Florida has been called a “ground zero” for climate change in America, as the state is expected to face the highest temperature rise in the southeast; […]

2019 October 17, Matt Stieb, “Florida GOP Regrets ‘Lost’ Decade on Climate Change”, in New York Magazine

For Larson and other activists, Kamilo Beach has become ground zero of the crisis.

2020 January 10, Liz Barney, Michelle Broder Van Dyke, “Welcome to Hawaii's ‘plastic beach’, one of the world's dirtiest places”, in The Guardian

The two West Virginia local authorities accuse the distributors of turning Cabell county, with a population of just 90,000, into the “ground zero of the opioid epidemic sweeping the nation”, by flooding the area with nearly 100m opioid pills over a decade.

2021 May 3, Chris McGreal, “‘Ground zero of the opioid epidemic’: West Virginia puts drug giants on trial”, in The Guardian

(by extension) The location of any disaster or violent assault.


tackle

tackle (countable and uncountable, plural tackles)

From Middle English takel (“gear, apparatus”), from Middle Dutch or Middle Low German takel (“ship's rigging”), perhaps related to Middle Dutch taken (“to grasp, seize”). Akin to Danish takkel (“tackle”), Swedish tackel (“tackle”). More at take.

der

2004 June 24–30, "Jeff Gordon Never Gets Tired Of Seeing Face On Cheap Plastic Crap", The Onion, available in Embedded in America, →ISBN, page 193,
... an illuminated license-plate frame bearing his likeness, signature, and yellow number 24. "That there's a real nice piece of tackle. ..."

(uncountable, informal, by extension) Equipment, gear, gadgetry.


pill

* From Middle English pille (also pillem), a borrowing from Middle Low German pille or Middle Dutch pille (whence Dutch pil), probably from Latin pila, pilula.
* (persuade or convince): Generalized from red pill.

Take two pills every hour in the apyrexia of intermittent fever, until eight are taken.

1864, Benjamin Ellis, The Medical Formulary

(broadly) A small, usually round or cylindrical object designed for easy swallowing, usually containing some sort of medication.

Coordinate term: capsule

en:any tablet or caplet, thus excluding capsules

(strictly) Such an object that is of solid constitution (usually of compressed, bonded powder) rather than a capsule (with a shell containing loose powder or liquid).


plume

en-verb

plume (third-person singular simple present plumes, present participle pluming, simple past and past participle plumed)

plumes (present singular third-person)
pluming (participle present)
plumed (participle past)
plumed (past)
plume (infinitive)

Sense 1 (“to adorn, cover, or furnish with feathers or plumes”) is derived from Anglo-Norman plumer (“to cover with or provide with feathers”), or its etymon Latin plūmāre, the present active infinitive of plūmō (“to grow feathers, to fledge; to cover with feathers, to feather; to embroider with a feathery pattern”) (and compare Late Latin plūmō (“to attach feathers to arrows; of a hawk: to pluck the feathers from prey; (figurative) to celebrate, praise”)), from plūma (“feather; plumage; down”) (see etymology 1) + -ō (suffix forming regular first-conjugation verbs).
Senses 2–4 (“to arrange and preen the feathers of; to congratulate (oneself) proudly; to strip of feathers”) are from Late Middle English plumen (“to remove the feathers from a bird; of a hawk: to pluck the feathers or the head from prey”) [and other forms], from Anglo-Norman and Middle French plumer (“to remove the feathers from a bird; to pull out (hairs, especially from a moustache); to rob”), from plūma (see etymology 1).
Sense 5 (“to fan out or spread in a cloud”) is derived from plume (noun).

der

He plumes himself on his skill.

But now thy armour beauteous, / all brass-belaid and sparkling, / Among the Troïans is held: / for motley-helmed Hector / Across his shoulders bearing it / plumeth himself; nor deem I / Long shall he vaunt it; sith alsó / on him o'erhangeth slaughter.

1856, Homer, “Book XVIII”, in F[rancis] W[illiam] Newman, transl., The Iliad of Homer: Faithfully Translated into Unrhymed English Meter, London: Walton and Maberly, […], →OCLC, page 322, lines 130–133

Challenger plumed himself like some unwieldy bird under the influence of flattery.

1929, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Disintegration Machine

(transitive, reflexive, by extension) To congratulate (oneself) proudly, especially concerning something unimportant or when taking credit for another person's effort; to self-congratulate.

rehvastella

to congratulate (oneself) proudly — see also self-congratulate

(transitive, archaic) To strip (a bird) of feathers; to pluck.

(by extension) To peel, to strip completely; to pillage; also, to deprive of power.


shingle

From dialectal French chingler (“to strap, whip”), from Latin cingula (“girt, belt”), from cingere (“to girt”).

(by extension) Any paddle used for corporal punishment.


limbo

en-noun

limbo (countable and uncountable, plural limbos or limboes)

The noun is derived from Middle English limbo, lymbo (“place where innocent souls exist temporarily until they can enter heaven”), from Latin limbō, the ablative singular of limbus (“border, edge; hem; fringe, tassel”) (notably in expressions like in limbō (“in limbo”) and e limbō (“out of limbo”)); further etymology uncertain, possibly from Proto-Indo-European *lemb- (“to hang limply or loosely”), from Proto-Indo-European *leb- (“to hang down loosely (?)”). Doublet of limp.
The verb is derived from the noun.

der

My passport application has been stuck in bureaucratic limbo for two weeks.

Homœpathy, so-called, is an unutterable humbug, and is to be consigned to the eternal Limbos of the Unblessed—where, indeed, it is already for the most part gone.

1881 April 23, “Lord Beaconsfield and Homœpathy”, in George F[rederick] Shrady [Sr.], editor, The Medical Record: A Weekly Journal of Medicine and Surgery, volume 19, New York, N.Y.: William Wood & Co. […], →OCLC, page 466, column 1

[U]rged beyond that line where the soul is mistress over herself, he lost himself in those delicious limboes, which the vulgar call so foolishly "the imaginary regions."

1896, Honoré de Balzac, translated by Ernest Dowson, La Fille aux Yeux d’Or [The Girl with the Golden Eyes], London: Leonard Smithers […], →OCLC, page 95

His [Thomas De Witt Talmage's] so-called "sermons" are but fragmentary and usually ignorant allusions to things in general. He seldom or never encroaches upon the realms of science and philosophy, although he frequently attempts it, and evidently imagines that he is succeeding admirably, when he is but sloshing around, like a drunken comet that is chiefly tail, in inane limboes.

a. 1899 (date written), William Cowper Brann, “Talmage the Turgid”, in The Complete Works of Brann the Iconoclast, volume I, New York, N.Y.: The Brann Publishers, published 1919, page 200

Like unbaptized children and the non-Christian righteous, black feminisms have been relegated to an outer realm where, while not exactly punished for their sins, they are ghettoized for an alleged poor timing and inability to encounter the "larger paradigms" undergirding existence. Women from oppressed peoples routinely find themselves in liberation limbos.

1997, Joy Ann James, “Black Feminism: Liberation Limbos and Existence in Gray”, in Lewis R[icardo] Gordon, editor, Existence in Black: An Anthology of Black Existential Philosophy, New York, N.Y., London: Routledge, part IV (Black Existence and Black Liberation), page 216

But the railway is in limbo, paralysed by indecision. Let's have some clarity.

2021 May 5, Philip Haigh, “I Think We Need Better than This from the Rail Industry”, in Rail, number 930, Peterborough, Cambridgeshire: Bauer Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 51

The bigger worry for the Mail is that, if any of the claims are successful, it could open the door for other cases against the newspaper that could leave it in legal limbo for years.

2022 October 7, Jim Waterson, “Legal action by Doreen Lawrence and Prince Harry could mire Daily Mail for years”, in Katharine Viner, editor, The Guardian, London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-03-14

(countable, uncountable) Chiefly preceded by in: any in-between place, or condition or state, of neglect or oblivion which results in deadlock, delay, or some other unresolved status.

llimbs

Patr[ick]. […] [S]hame burn my cheek! My maſter, d'ye ſee, had gotten into the limboes; […] / Major C[amden]. But vvhat do you mean by your maſter's being in the limboes, Patrick? / Patr. VVhy, Maſter Tipſtaff here—Isn't it Tipſtaff ye call him?—kidnapped him; that's all, Honey.

1796 February, Constantia [pseudonym; Judith Sargent Murray], “The Traveller Returned, Concluded”, in The Gleaner. A Miscellaneous Production. […], volume III, number LXXXIV, Boston, Mass.: […] I[saiah] Thomas and E[benezer] T. Andrews, […], →OCLC, act IV, scene iii, page 156

Blind Thaddeus O'Gorman was soon sent to limbo, safely secured in the police lock-up at Green Skipperton, whence he was removed next day to the nearest gaol, there to await trial at the next assize.

1894, Arthur [George Frederick] Griffiths, “Commonplace Criminals”, in Secrets of the Prison-house: Or Gaol Studies and Sketches […], volume II, London: Chapman and Hall, →OCLC, page 144

(slang, archaic, uncountable) Jail, prison; (countable) a jail cell or lockup.

(uncountable, obsolete) Synonym of Hades or Hell

(uncountable, obsolete) Synonym of pawn (“the state of something being held as security for a loan, or as a pledge”)


limbo

en-verb

limbo (third-person singular simple present limbos, present participle limboing, simple past and past participle limboed)

limbos (present singular third-person)
limboing (participle present)
limboed (participle past)
limboed (past)

Origin uncertain; possibly an alteration of limber (“bendable, flexible, pliant”) with the ending of the word respelled to represent a Caribbean English pronunciation.
It is unclear whether the verb is derived from the noun, or the noun is derived from the verb; the noun is attested slightly earlier.

How low can you go? Technology stocks limboed lower and lower last week as investors danced to the profit-taking beat.

1990 March 26, “Low Motion: Technology Firms Dip, Pivot as Investors Drum Up Profits”, in Bill Laberis, editor, Computerworld: The Newsweekly of Information Systems Management, volume XXIV, number 13, Framingham, Mass.: CW Communications, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 7, column 3

Ahn slept over on Friday night, and as soon as the parents were asleep, Dana and Ahn limboed under the criss-cross barriers into the secret chamber.

1994, Lois Ruby, “No Nancy Drews”, in Steal Away Home (Aladdin Historical Fiction), New York, N.Y.: Aladdin Paperbacks, published January 1999, page 41

[T]he Private […] limboed to his seat [in a mini-submarine], thrusting his chest up and twisting to the right, one arm behind him, steadying himself on the chair as he slid in.

1995 November, Jeff Rovin with created by Tom Clancy and Steve Pieczenik, “Tuesday, 12:26 A.M., Helsinki”, in Tom Clancy’s Op-Center: Mirror Image (Tom Clancy’s Op-Center), New York, N.Y.: Berkley Books

[W]e find that the NRC does a very good job at setting the safety bar at the right height. […] They don't do a very good job of enforcing those regulations. Too many plant owners are limboing beneath the safety bar for too long, putting Americans at higher risk, and additionally driving the costs of nuclear power upwards inexplicably.

2011 May 13, David Lochbaum (witness), “Statement of Mr. David Lochbaum, Director, Nuclear Safety Project, Union of Concerned Scientists”, in Nuclear Energy Risk Management: Hearing before the Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight, Joint with the Subcommittee on Energy and Environment, Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, House of Representatives, One Hundred Twelfth Congress, First Session […] (Serial No. 122-18), Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, page 199

Daisy-Mae [a dog] also distinguishes herself by limboing under the picnic ground fence. I have to go back in order to use the gate into this spot, where I can retrieve the little madam.

2012 September 24, Anthony Linick, “June 2007”, in A Doggy Day in London Town: Life among the Dog People of Paddington Rec, volume IV, Bloomington, Ind.: AuthorHouse, page 27

(by extension, also figuratively) Often followed by under: to pass under something, especially while bending backwards.


methodology

en-noun

methodology (countable and uncountable, plural methodologies)

From French méthodologie. By surface analysis, method + -ology.

agile methodology

For example, an agile methodology should promote the frequent delivery of working systems rather than a single big bang delivery.

2006, John Hunt, Agile Software Construction, Springer Science & Business Media, page 12

Design Methodology is understood as a concrete course of action for the design of technical systems that derives its knowledge from design science and cognitive psychology, and from practical experience in different domains.

2011, Herbert Birkhofer, The Future of Design Methodology, Springer Science & Business Media, page 2

(loosely) A collection of methods, practices, procedures and rules used by those who work in some field.

metodologia

a collection of methods, practices, procedures and rules used by those who work in some field


prestidigitation

prestidigitation (countable and uncountable, plural prestidigitations)

/ˌpɹɛstɪˌdɪd͡ʒɪˈteɪʃən/

/ˌpɹɛstəˌdɪd͡ʒɪˈteɪʃən/

From French prestidigitation, from French preste (“nimble, quick”) + Latin digitus (“finger”) + French -ation (process suffix). The word has a different origin from prestige, even though this in the past has meant “delusion, illusion, trick”.

af

His writing was peppered with verbal tricks and prestidigitation.

The more modest place became the picture better; yet, as my eyes grew accustomed to the half-light, all the characteristic qualities came out--all the hesitations disguised as audacities, the tricks of prestidigitation by which, with such consummate skill, he managed to divert attention from the real business of the picture to some pretty irrelevance of detail.

(by extension) A show of skill or deceitful cleverness.


apocope

en-noun

apocope (countable and uncountable, plural apocopes)

Learned borrowing from Late Latin apocopē, from Ancient Greek ἀποκοπή (apokopḗ), ἀποκόπτω (apokóptō, “cut off”).

lbor

(loosely) The loss or omission of a sound or syllable from the end of a word.


shvitz

en-noun

shvitz (countable and uncountable, plural shvitzes)

Borrowed from Yiddish שוויצן (shvitsn), from Old High German swizzen (Modern German schwitzen), from Proto-Germanic *swait- (English sweat), from Proto-Indo-European *swoyd- (“to sweat”). Doublet of sweat.

der

(by extension) A sauna or sauna session.


dead-end

Mary realised her relationship with Jim had hit a dead-end.

(by extension, figuratively) A position that offers no hope of progress.


football field

(by extension) An informal unit of measure of area, equal to the area of an American football field (57,600 square feet or 1.32 acres).


manufactured

en-adj

manufactured (comparative more manufactured, superlative most manufactured)

more manufactured (comparative)
most manufactured (superlative)

a manufactured boy band


guillotine

Borrowed from French guillotine, named after the French physician Joseph-Ignace Guillotin (1738–1814), who proposed its use for capital punishment.

named-after

/ˌɡɪləˈtiːn/

LL-Q1860 (eng)-I learned some phrases-guillotine.wav

A device or machine with a cutting blade.

A device used for cutting the pages of books, stacks of paper, etc., to straight edges, usually by means of a hinged or sliding blade attached to a flat platform.

guillotina

(surgery) An instrument with a sliding blade for cutting the tonsils, uvula, or other body parts.

The right hon. Gentleman is making a great stooshie about time in relation to this Bill, but was it not the case that, when the SNP [Scottish National Party] Scottish Government introduced their continuity Bill in the Scottish Parliament, they operated a ruthless guillotine to prevent proper scrutiny of it? That is the case; they ran a guillotine on that Bill, and there was a very limited amount of time allowed for debate and scrutiny, yet he complains about that happening here.

2019 October 22, Stephen Kerr, Member of Parliament for Stirling, “Second Reading of the European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Bill”, in House of Commons Debates (House of Commons)Bill), volume 666, archived from the original on 2019-10-24, column 860

(British) A parliamentary procedure for fixing the dates when various stages of discussion of a bill must end, to ensure that the enactment of the bill proceeds expeditiously.

(US) A legislative motion that debate be ended and a vote taken; a cloture.


one-hit wonder

The European company is no one-hit wonder. The company has another best seller in its J-class car, sold as a Vauxhall Cavalier.

1990 February 19, S. C. Gwynne, “Two Sides of a Giant”, in Time

(idiomatic, by extension) A person or group known for achieving only a single major accomplishment.


broadside

Although slaveholders managed - through a combination of political compromise and ideological broadside - to contain the threat of a major anti-slavery compaign by fellow Southerners, planters could never be totally sure of non-slaveholders' loyalty to the social order.

1993, Peter Kolchin, American Slavery (Penguin History, paperback edition, 34)

Fernández's diplomatic broadside follows the British government's decision last month to name a large frozen chunk of Antarctica after the Queen – a gesture viewed in Buenos Aires as provocative.

2013 January 3, Luke Harding, Uki Goni, The Guardian

He delivered a broadside to the RMT leadership, saying: "This response to a significantly enhanced offer exposes their true priority - using the British public and NR workers as pawns in a fight with the Government.

2022 December 14, Mel Holley, “Network News: Strikes go on as RMT rejects RDG's "detrimental" offer”, in RAIL, number 972, page 9

(by extension) A forceful attack, be it written or spoken.


hypertrophy

en-verb

hypertrophy (third-person singular simple present hypertrophies, present participle hypertrophying, simple past and past participle hypertrophied)

hypertrophies (present singular third-person)
hypertrophying (participle present)
hypertrophied (participle past)
hypertrophied (past)

From French hypertrophie, from Ancient Greek ὑπέρ (hupér, “over, excessive”) + τροφή (trophḗ, “nourishment”).

der

Like a well-exercised muscle, 'network' has hypertrophied into a master concept.

2020, Merlin Sheldrake, Entangled Life, page 76


quarterback

en-verb

quarterback (third-person singular simple present quarterbacks, present participle quarterbacking, simple past and past participle quarterbacked)

quarterbacks (present singular third-person)
quarterbacking (participle present)
quarterbacked (participle past)
quarterbacked (past)

From quarter + back, in reference to position in front of the halfback position.

Wayman's major responsibility is to quarterback the team, coordinating business development, project scheduling and management and quality control.

1981, “Interiors roundtable”, in Lodging Hospitality, volume 37, page 250

(by extension) To lead a team or group; to be primarily responsible for some group project or activity.


tab

First attested 1607, of uncertain origin.

graphical user interface
graphical user interface

(by extension, graphical user interface) A navigational widget, resembling a physical tab, for switching between documents or sets of controls.


tab

Apocopation (shortening) of (variously) tabulate, tabulator, or tabulation.

Moreover, at a tab of $9 million, the system's price is about $1 million less than a conventional heating-cooling plant […]

(by extension) The cost or bill for anything.


unfettered

en-adj

unfettered (comparative more unfettered, superlative most unfettered)

more unfettered (comparative)
most unfettered (superlative)

We declare the right of the people of Ireland to the ownership of Ireland, and to the unfettered control of Irish destinies, to be sovereign and indefeasible.

1916, Thomas Clarke, Proclamation of the Irish Republic

Alexander says she has been accused of censorship "worse than a Syrian dictator" over her quest to have gang-related videos taken down. But her campaign shows the debate over a completely unfettered internet is not clear-cut.

2012 April 19, Josh Halliday, “Free speech haven or lawless cesspool – can the internet be civilised?”, in the Guardian

The EU was established to oppose the unfettered power of nation states and defuse the rivalries between them.

2018, Michael Cottakis – LSE, “Colliding worlds: Donald Trump and the European Union”, in LSE's blog

The underlying problem with transport policy is that there no coherent strategy. Ministers have tended to encourage greater use of motor vehicles through both transport and (particularly) planning policies, while simultaneously warning of the terrible consequences of unfettered growth of road use.

2020 December 2, Christian Wolmar, “Wales offers us a glimpse of an integrated transport policy”, in Rail, page 56


bacillus

Learned borrowing from Latin bacillus (“little staff, wand”), diminutive of baculum (“stick, staff, walking stick”).

lbor

The “bacillus of boom or depression,” he wrote, travels freely “from country to country.”

1934 [2018], Gottfried Haberler quoted in Quinn Slobodian, Globalists, 71

(figurative, by extension) Something which spreads like bacterial infection.


marshal

en-verb

marshal (third-person singular simple present marshals, present participle marshalling or marshaling, simple past and past participle marshalled or marshaled)

marshals (present singular third-person)
marshalling (participle present)
marshaling (participle present)
marshalled (participle past)
marshalled (past)
marshaled (participle past)
marshaled (past)

From Middle English marschal, from Anglo-Norman mareschal (“farrier; military commander”), from Medieval Latin mariscalcus (“groom, army commander, court dignitary”), either from Frankish *marhaskalk, or Old High German marah-scalc (“horse-servant”), from Proto-West Germanic *marh + *skalk (whence Old Saxon maraskalk, marahscalc). Compare English mare + shalk.

der

This train is formed only of "Blue Spot" wagons for London; vans for Mac Fisheries Finsbury Park depot are marshalled at the rear to be detached at Finsbury Park.

1963 December, “The fish traffic of Aberdeen”, in Modern Railways, page 389

(by extension) To arrange (facts, etc.) in some methodical order.


aprosdoketon

en-noun

aprosdoketon (plural aprosdoketons or aprosdoketa)

aprosdoketons (plural)
aprosdoketa (plural)

From Ancient Greek ἀπροσδόκητος (aprosdókētos, “unexpected”).

der

ἀπροσδόκητος

In later restagings of the Thesmophoriazusae, as in the 1959 Frogs, Euripides made his appearance driving a motorcycle. This scenic aprosdoketon was, of course, an ingenious verbal and visual pun on the word mechane and its different meanings in ancient and modern Greek: "stage crane" and "motorbike," respectively.

2000, Gonda A. H. Van Steen, Venom in Verse

(by extension) Any surprising use or interpretation of language.


underhand

en-adj

underhand (comparative more underhand, superlative most underhand)

more underhand (comparative)
most underhand (superlative)

(by extension) dishonest and sneaky; done in a secret or sly manner


Barmy Army

An English football chant, in which supporters of a team would chant that they were the team manager's "barmy army", was applied to a particularly "barmy" group of supporters who followed the English cricket team to Australia in 1994–95 despite the team being seen as having little prospect of success.
The origin of "Barmy Army" was based on a soubriquet by Leeds United supporters for Howard Wilkinson, the team manager during the late eighties and early nineties. He was known as Sergeant Wilko - a skit on Sergeant Bilko, a well known comedy character portrayed by Phil Silvers a couple of decades earlier, but still at the time on TV. Sergeant Bilko's army became Sergeant Wilko's army, the barmy bit was added because it's Yorkshire and it makes a good chant. It was picked up by other teams, whereupon the Sergeant Wilko bit was dropped. Then by cricket people. The tune is the same though.

The Barmy Army burst into life, and the sheer numbers of those supporting the Three Lions became evident as the stadium bowl vibrated in tune with their chants.

2022 November 29, Ian Mitchelmore, “Wales put out of World Cup misery by England as sobering tournament must signal changing of the guard”, in WalesOnline

(by extension) The England supporters in other sports, for example those of the England national football team.


perspiration

en-noun

perspiration (usually uncountable, plural perspirations)

/ˌpɜːspəˈɹeɪʃən/

/ˌpɝspəˈɹeɪʃən/

Borrowed from late Middle French perspiration, from perspirer (“perspire”), from Latin perspirare (“to blow or breathe constantly”), from per (“through”) + spirare (“to breathe, blow”)
Morphologically perspire + -ation

der

genius is one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent perspiration

Genius is 1 per cent. inspiration and 99 per cent. perspiration.

1910, Frank Lewis Dyer, Thomas Commerford Martin, quoting Thomas Edison, Edison: His Life and Inventions, volume II, New York: Harper & Brothers, page 607


shuffle

Originally the same word as scuffle, and properly a frequentative of shove.

(by extension, music) A rhythm commonly used in blues music. Consists of a series of triplet notes with the middle note missing, so that it sounds like a long note followed by a short note. Sounds like a walker dragging one foot.


accouterment

From Middle French accoustrement, from accoustrer, from Old French acostrer (“arrange, sew up”), first attested in the 1540s.

By the summer of 1964 they had achieved the bigger house on the better street and the familiar accouterments of a family on its way up: the $30,000 a year, the three children for the Christmas card, the picture window, the family room, […]

1968, Joan Didion, “Life Styles in the Golden Land”, in Slouching Towards Bethlehem

But musical ancestry aside, the influence to which [Justin] Bieber is most beholden is the current trends in pop music, which means Believe is loaded up with EDM accouterments, […]

2012 June 26, Genevieve Koski, “Music: Reviews: Justin Bieber: Believe”, in The A.V. Club, archived from the original on 2020-08-06

(by extension) An identifying yet superficial characteristic.


coo

An infant has only cries and coos with which to communicate distress and well-being. Adults have many more ways of expressing themselves. However, their expressions of disease and ease can be boiled down to sophisticated cries and coos. A call for help in whatever form is a cry. A sense of well-being however expressed is a coo. Healing in the context of cries and coos can be viewed as the process of resolving the cries and fostering the coos.

2001, Denton L. Roberts, Caddy Roberts-Williams, “What You Need to Know to Be Useful”, in Living as Healer: (Everyone Does Therapy and Should … Know How), Pasadena, Calif.: Hope Publishing House, page 23

(by extension) An expression of pleasure made by a person.


repose

en-noun

repose (countable and uncountable, plural reposes)

Berthe Morisot
Rhode Island School of Design Museum
Édouard Manet

The verb is derived from Middle English reposen (“to rest”), from Anglo-Norman reposer, reposir, and Middle French reposer, from Old French reposer, repauser (“to become calm; to be peaceful; to rest; to be immobile; to lie or be placed; to cease, stop; to neglect”) (modern French reposer), from Latin repausāre, the present active infinitive of repausō (“(Late Latin) to be at rest; to lie down, rest; to sleep; to calm, pacify; (Latin) to halt temporarily, pause”), from re- (prefix meaning ‘again; back, backwards’) + pausō (“to cease, halt; to pause”) (from pausa (“a halt, stop; a pause; an end”), from Ancient Greek παῦσῐς (paûsis, “ceasing, stopping”), from παύω (paúō, “to cease; to make to cease, stop; to bring to an end; to hinder”) (further etymology uncertain; possibly from Proto-Indo-European *peh₂w- (“few, little; smallness”)) + -σῐς (-sis, suffix forming abstract nouns or nouns of action, process, or result)).
The noun is derived from Late Middle English repose, from Anglo-Norman repous, repos, and Middle French repos, repose, from Old French repos (“calm; rest; period or state of sleep; state of immobility; state of inaction”) (modern French repos), from reposer, repauser (verb) (see above).
Noun sense 12.3 (“technique of including in a painting an area or areas which are dark, indistinct, or soft in tone”) is borrowed from French repos.
cognates
* Catalan reposar (verb), repòs (noun)
* Italian riposare (verb), riposo (noun)
* Old Occitan repausar, repauzar (verb), repaus (noun)
* Portuguese repousar (verb), repouso (noun)
* Spanish reposar (verb), reposo (noun)

ref

From the collection of the Rhode Island School of Design Museum, Providence, Rhode Island, U.S.A.

հանգիստ

temporary cessation from activity to rest and recover, especially in the form of sleep; an instance of this — see also break, rest

(uncountable) Temporary cessation from activity to rest and recover, especially in the form of sleep; rest; (countable) an instance of this; a break, a rest; a sleep.

(uncountable) Of the Virgin Mary: death; also assumption into heaven.

(countable, Eastern Orthodoxy) The festival honouring the assumption of the Virgin Mary into heaven, celebrated on August 15.


mom

(spoken by the father) I don't share it with mom! Right, mom?

(Canada, South Africa, US, West Midlands, colloquial, informal) Mother.

(by extension) used as a term of address for one's wife


bubblegum

(by extension) Sweet, perky, or youthful.


scoreboard

As a result of the Santiago Principles and other parallel efforts at education such as the SWF scoreboad that I have featured in my research, a substantial amount of distrust surrounding SWFs has been defused.

2010, Edwin M. Truman, Sovereign Wealth Funds: Threat Or Salvation?, page 8

If you are curious about what each of those processes were doing last, just scroll down the page to the table and find the process of the correct number in the scoreboard.

2012, Kyle Rankin, DevOps Troubleshooting: Linux Server Best Practices

(by extension) A listing of various similar entities along with their properties, such as status or rank.


cathode

From Ancient Greek κατα- (kata-, “down”) and ὁδός (hodós, “journey, way”), forming the New Greek compound κάθοδος (káthodos, “way down, descent”). Coined by English polymath William Whewell in 1834 for Michael Faraday, who introduced it later that year.

coin

(by extension) The electrode at which chemical reduction of cations takes place, usually resulting in the deposition of metal onto the electrode.


coup de grâce

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Persent101-coup de grâce.wav

/kuː də ɡɹɑː/

Late 17th century. Borrowed from French coup de grâce (“finishing blow”). Originally referring to a merciful stroke putting a fatally wounded person out of misery or to the shot delivered to the head of a prisoner after facing a firing squad.

(by extension) A remarkable finishing action.


Madison Avenue

From Madison Avenue, a north-south avenue in the borough of Manhattan in New York City, where advertising boomed in the 1920s.

Maligned by rockers, misunderstood by critics, and merched by Madison Avenue, rave may be the only vital youth culture remaining.

1995, SPIN, volume 11, number 1, page 10

(by extension) The American advertising industry, regardless of location.


barrage

Unadapted borrowing from French barrage (“barrage, barrier”) c. 1859. Compare barrier.

ubor

Lesser lawyers who were vague in oral argument faced a barrage of sarcasm or, if he agreed with them, constant chiding to do better.

2016 February 20, “Obituary: Antonin Scalia: Always right”, in The Economist

(by extension) An overwhelming outburst of words, especially of criticism.


steroidal

Weaning China off steroidal industrial policies that feel good in the short run but are toxic in the long run is the key to sustained, high-quality growth and reconciliation of international disputes.

2023, Keyu Jin, The New China Playbook, page 48

(by extension, economics) Characterized by rapid growth, especially growth that is unsustainable or out of line with economic fundamentals or expectations.


engagement

en-noun

engagement (countable and uncountable, plural engagements)

In a recent study with a movie recommendation site […], higher message interactivity in the form of footprints of user actions, responsive suggestions in a search box, and live-chatting with an online agent led to greater perceived contingency and engagement with the site, which ultimately created more positive attitudes toward it and higher intention to recommend the site to others.

2012, James Price Dillard, Lijiang Shen, The SAGE Handbook of Persuasion: Developments in Theory and Practice

(uncountable, by extension, about human emotional state) The feeling of being compelled, drawn in, connected to what is happening, interested in what will happen next.


fusty

en-adj

fusty (comparative fustier, superlative fustiest)

fustier (comparative)
fustiest (superlative)

From Old French fust (“wood”) (modern French fût (“cask”)), from Latin fūstis (“a cudgel”).
Compare Scots foosty.

In contrast to exploitation or suppression or even alienation, involution is presented as part of the natural order of things—like bad weather. You can’t point fingers at an abstraction or rally against a fusty term from an anthropology text.

2021 May 14, Yi-Ling Liu, “China’s “Involuted” Generation”, in The New Yorker

An anonymously sourced report by one of Britain’s freewheeling tabloid newspapers has sparked a debate over both tabloid journalistic ethics and sexism in Parliament, leading some to question whether the institution is capable of shedding its fusty reputation and becoming an inclusive workplace.

2022 April 26, Stephen Castle, Megan Specia, “U.K. Tabloid Accuses Lawmaker of ‘Basic Instinct’ Move, Highlighting Sexism in Parliament”, in The New York Times, →ISSN

Oh sweet surprise - oh dear delight
To find it undisputed quite -
All musty, fusty rules despite,
That Art is wrong and Nature right!

1893, W. S. Gilbert, Utopia, Limited, Act II

(figuratively, by extension) Old-fashioned, refusing to change or update.

старомоден

old-fashioned, refusing to change or update


leverage

en-noun

leverage (usually uncountable, plural leverages)

/ˈlɛv(ə)ɹɪd͡ʒ/

Try using competitors’ prices for leverage in the negotiation.

The former Forest man, who passed a late fitness test, appeared to use Guy Moussi for leverage before nodding in David Fox's free-kick at the far post - his 22nd goal of the season.

2011 April 15, Saj Chowdhury, “Norwich 2 - 1 Nott'm Forest”, in BBC Sport

(by extension) Any influence which is compounded or used to gain an advantage.


ingestion

ingestion (countable and uncountable, plural ingestions)

/ɪnˈd͡ʒɛst͡ʃən/

(by extension) The process of ingesting something into a jet engine or an instance.


tweet

Onomatopoeic of the sound made by a bird. Compare twitter. The social media senses evolved from earlier Twitter update, twit (noun), twitter (verb).

He was watching the media coverage, talking to his lawyers. And we saw that because of his tweets on Truth Social, or his posts on Truth Social.

2023 August 3, Kristen Holmes, The Lead with Jake Tapper, CNN

(social media, by extension) An entry on any microblogging service.