biblioklept \BIB-lee-uh-klept\, noun:
A person who steals books.
I'd told Charlie weeks ago about my collision with the book thief, so the idea of a...what had Dennis called it?...a biblioklept ...wouldn't exactly be news to him.
-- Joanne Dobson, The Maltese Manuscript: A Professor Karen Pelletier Mystery
"Our Scrapbook of minutes was stolen by some biblioklept."
-- Christopher Morley, On belonging to clubs
Biblioklept forms from two Greek roots: biblio-, 'book," and klept, "thief."
svelte \SFELT\, adjective:
1. Slender, especially gracefully slender in figure.
2. Suave; blandly urbane.
In 1944 his mother had been a relatively svelte one hundred and eighty pounds.
-- Stephen King, It: A Novel
"When I walk under one of the pathway lamps and look down you can indeed see the silhouette of my body which doesn't look quite as svelte and hourglassy as I believe it did just an hour ago when I was admiring myself in the mirror.
-- Terry McMillan, How Stella Got Her Groove Back
Svelte enters English in 1800s from the French, and originally derives from the Latin verb exvellere, "to stretch out."
rime \RAHYM\, noun:
A coating of tiny, white, granular ice particles, caused by the rapid freezing of water droplets.
The Chief's follow spot cast a light like a rime of ice into the murk, and mom swam inside this circle across the entire length of the lake.
-- Karen Russell, Swamplandia!
When it got real fierce, when your very speech would freeze as it emanated from your lips and blow back in stinging rime against the cheeks, we hung close to the tepees and ate the dried meat taken the summer before and stored in rawhide parfleches and pemmican, the greasier the better on account of a bellyful of melting fat will warm you sooner and stick longer than most anything I know.
-- Thomas Berger, Little Big Man
Rime, also known as hoarfrost, comes from the Old English hrim. Used mainly in Northern England and Scotland for centuries, it was revived in literature in the 19th century.
fainaigue \fuh-NEYG\, verb:
1. To shirk; evade work or responsibility.
2. To renege at cards.
I finally fainaigue a tin plate out of the mess department, for which I am required to give two lire.
-- Harry Partch, Thomas McGeary, Bitter Music: Collected Journals, Essays, Introductions, and Librettos
I've a two-year stretch up here, unless I quit or fainaigue a transfer.
-- "Astounding Science fiction, Volume 31, issue 21943"
Fainaigue stems from British dialect, but its exact origins are unclear. Whether or not it has a relationship to finagle is a source of debate.
amygdaliform \uh-MIG-duh-luh-fawrm\, adjective:
Shaped like an almond.
She is naturally blonde, pale, with amygdaliform eyes and high cheekbones.
-- Gulnar Nazarkhan, The Secret World
The size and shape of the spores are quite distinctive (globose to subglobose, ovoid, elongate and often almond-shaped – amygdaliform) and with surface ornamentation which may be coarse or fine and individual ornamentation may be low or high and blunt and pointed.
-- Alec Wood, What Cortinarius Is That?
Amygdaliform derives from the Greek amygdale, "almond." -form is the common suffix denoting "in the shape of." A portion of the human brain is known as the amygdala, named for its resemblance to almonds.
potvaliancy \POT-val-yuhn-see\, noun:
Brave only as a result of being drunk.
Obed looked over his shoulder, peering at me with his little short—sighted pig's eyes, into which, in my potvaliancy, I immediately chucked half a tumbler of very strong grog, and under cover of it attempted to bolt through the scuttle.
-- Michael Scott, Tom Cringle's Log
His bursts of potvaliancy (the male side of the maiden Panic within his bosom) are awful to his friends.
-- George Meredith, Beauchamp's Career, Volume 1
Potvaliancy combines the original sense of pot as "drinking cup" with valiancy, which derives from the verb valere, "to be strong."
balsamaceous \bawl-suh-MEY-shuhs\, adjective:
Possessing healing or restorative qualities.
Minus the balsamaceous or incense resins and portrayed as Osiris, God of the Dead, he evidently did not lean toward the "spirit" side.
-- Journal of the American Society of Naval Engineers, inc, Volume 52, Issue 3, 1940.
[Myrrh is] a brown aromatic gum resin with a bitter pungent taste derived from a balsamaceous shrub, Balsamea myrrha.
-- C. Raimer Smith, The Physician Examines the Bible
Balsamaceous derives from the Latin balsamum, "resin of the Balsam tree." This substance is historically celebrated for its aroma and healing properties.
agape \ah-GAH-pey\, noun:
1. Unselfish love of one person for another without sexual implications.
2. The love of Christians for other persons, corresponding to the love of God for humankind.
In theological sermons we are used to hearing of a great distinction between fleshly and spiritual love, eros and agape.
-- Joseph Campbell, The Flight of the Wild Gander: Essays
Not even the shift that Auden himself saw in the poem, that from erotic love with its inevitable undertones of egotism and potential failure to a brotherly love embodied in agape, is completely evident.
-- Rainer Emig, W.H. Auden: Towards a Postmodern Poetics
Agape originates as the Greek agapen, "to greet with affection." The term was adopted by early Christians in connection with celebrations. The general sense of "love without sexual aspects" came into use in the 1800s.
giblets \JIB-lits\, noun:
The heart, liver, gizzard, and the like, of a fowl, often cooked separately.
She prods the chicken, flexes a wing, pokes a finger into the cavity, fishes out the giblets.
-- Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale
Whatever you say to such people, they think you're talking about their problem, like the story of the cat, where the couple was arguing about a divorce but the cat thought they were disagreeing about the giblets for its lunch.
-- Umberto Eco, Foucault's Pendulum
Giblets most likely derives from the Old French gibelet, "a stew made from wild game."
fob \FOB\, noun:
1. A short chain, usually with a medallion or similar ornament, worn hanging from a pocket.
2. A small pocket just below the waistline in trousers for a watch, keys, change, etc.
verb:
1. To cheat someone by substituting something spurious or inferior.
2. To put (someone) off by deception or trickery.
Out of the right fob hung a great silver chain, with a wonderful kind of engine at the bottom.
-- Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels
The father had bought the bridegroom a fob watch as a gift.
-- Sholem Aleichem, Aliza Shevrin, Tevye the Dairyman: And, Motl the Cantor's Son
Fob most likely derives from the Germanic fopke, "pocket."
ogle \OH-guhl\, verb:
1. To look at amorously, flirtatiously, or impertinently.
2. To eye; look or stare at.
He always pretended to be deeply exhausted from his various adventures, but he was never too exhausted to ogle— as she knew and as Flap knew too.
-- Larry McMurtry, Terms of Endearment: A Novel
Couples ogle cakes in windows.
-- Simon Louvish, The Days of Miracles and Wonders: An Epic of the New World Disorder
Ogle traces its origins from the Lower German oeglen, "to look at," but ultimately comes from a now extinct word for "eye," oog
terpsichorean \turp-si-kuh-REE-uhn\, adjective:
1. Pertaining to dancing.
noun:
1. A dancer.
I even saw Major West that evening tapping his foot and picking up his feet in terpsichorean splendor with Mrs. West."
-- Jackson Bailey, My Love and I
They're agile, they're flexible, they're terpsichorean."
-- Tom Wolfe, A Man in Full
Terpsichorean comes from the name of the Greek muse of dancing, Terpischore. The word is a combination of the Greek terpein, "to delight," and -khoros, "chorus."
dog-ear \DAWG-eer\, verb:
1. To fold down the corner of a page in a book.
noun:
1. (In a book) a corner of a page folded over like a dog's ear, as by careless use, or to mark a place.
2. In architecture, another term for a crossette.
This was uncharacteristic of him, territorial as he was over books, always reminding me not to dog-ear pages.
-- Kaye Gibbons, Sights Unseen
I will dog-ear the pages, maybe even fill out the order form, but I won't get anything.
-- Elizabeth Berg, Until the Real Thing Comes Along
Dog-ear as a metaphor for the folded pages of a book first appears in the 1650s.
bird-dog \BURD-dawg\, verb:
1. To follow, watch carefully, or investigate.
2. In slang, to steal or attempt to steal another person's date.
noun:
1. One of various breeds of dogs trained to hunt or retrieve birds.
2. A person hired to locate special items or people, especially a talent scout who seeks out promising athletes.
"Connors thinks my department is so incompetent that he's sending someone to bird-dog my investigation?
-- Judith A. Jance, Partner in Crime
Smart organizations will assign an employee to bird-dog the consultant from the start and learn everything there is to know about a service or application.
-- Dan Tynan, Escaping Services Addiction, Infoworld, August, 2006.
Bird-dog derives from breeds of dogs used in hunting that are known for their tenacious sense for following birds. The sense "to attempt to steal someone else's date" originates in the 19th century.
dovetail \DUHV-teyl\, verb:
1. To join or fit together compactly or harmoniously.
2. In carpentry, a joint formed of one or more such tenons fitting tightlywithin corresponding mortises.
3. To join or fit together by means of a carpentry dovetail or dovetails.
noun:
1. In carpentry, a tenon broader at its end than at its base; pin.
But in "Arcadia" the two periods don't dovetail until the last part of the play.
-- Tom Stoppard, Mel Gussow, Conversations With Stoppard
They seemed, after a fashion, to dovetail horribly with something which I had dreamed or read, but which I could no longer remember.
-- H.P. Lovecraft, The Shadow Out of Time
Dovetail originates in woodworking, with a joint that resembles the tail of a dove. The figurative sense derives from the tight fit made by such a joint.
pigeonhole \PIJ-uhn-hohl\, verb:
1. To lay aside for use or reference at some later, indefinite time.
noun:
1. One of a series of small, open compartments, as in a desk,cabinet, or the like, used for filing or sorting papers, letters,etc.
2. In printing, white space created by setting words or lines too far apart.
"Mobility's hard in Spain; people pigeonhole you for life in the box where they think you belong."
-- Enrique Vila-Mata, Dublinesque
Even his staunchest supporters didn't know where to pigeonhole him politically.
-- Bruce Duffy, The World As I Found It
Pigeonhole begins with the sense of a literal nesting place for the bird, then finds figurative usage in printing. The first use as a verb is recorded in 1854.
disbosom \dis-BOOZ-uhm\, verb:
To reveal; confess.
In the field of private space to relax, drink vodka and philosophize in the kitchen, to denounce officials, disbosom.
-- Sergey Gavrov, Modernization of the Empire
Desiring that some light refreshments, with wine and water, should be carried up into the library, she ran up thither instantly, thinking, it is true, very little about such matters, and eager only to disbosom herself to her father, as soon as possible, of her important tidings.
-- Henry William Herbert, Marmaduke Wyvil; or, The maid's revenge
Disbosom comes from the ancient word bosom, which possibly goes back to the roots of the Indo-European languages. Bosom can mean "breast; womb; surface; or ship's hold." The first recorded use of disbosom is in the 18th century.
troth \TRAWTH\, noun:
1. Faithfulness, fidelity, or loyalty.
2. One's word or promise, especially in engaging oneself to marry.
I did therefore what an honest man should--restored the maiden her troth , and departed the country in the service of my king.
-- James Fenimore Cooper, The Leatherstocking Tales
I was wild--in troth I might go yet farther and say VERY wild, though 'twas a wildness of an innocent sort, since it hurt none but me, brought shame to none, nor loss, nor had in it any taint of crime or baseness, or what might not beseem mine honourable degree.
-- Mark Twain, The Prince and the Pauper
Troth derives from a variation of truth in certain regions of England. Over time it has taken on a distinct meaning in certain phrases
armistice \AHR-muh-stis\, noun:
A temporary suspension of hostilities by agreement of the warring parties.
Then one day, without warning, as though she, too, had accepted the armistice and the capitulation, the grandmother departed to visit her son in Mills City.
-- William Faulkner, Elly
Bill had eaten at the restaurant in 1918, and right after the armistice, and Madame Lecomte made a great fuss over seeing him.
-- Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises
Armistice is a Latin compound created by 17th century scholars. The Latin arma-, "arms," combines with sistere, "to be still."
nictitate \NIK-ti-teyt\, verb:
To wink.
In Brakhage's hand- painted films, the isolated flecks, dripped trails, shaped smears, and layered washes of ink and paint all nictitate in bursts of patterned color against richly black ungiving grounds, flaring and disappearing with a rate that often renders them difficult to retain, or at times even to perceive with any certainty.
-- David E. James, Stan Brakhage: Filmmaker
The kid's upper lip is latticed with cracks and his eyes nictitate, a trace of buzz melting from them.
-- Don Waters, Desert Gothic
Nictitate stems from the Latin nictare, "to wink or blink."
cahoots \kuh-HOOT\, noun:
In partnership; in league.
The soldier could only have concluded that my grandfather was in serious cahoots with John Brown, and attention of that kind could destroy everything.
-- Marilynne Robinson, Gilead: A Novel
The dreamers did not know that Kuyo and I, as if in cahoots with the soldiers, had trapped and imprisoned them on the island.
-- Russell Banks, The Darling: A Novel
Cahoots enters English in the United States in the 1800s, possibly derived from the French cahute, "cabin, hut," but others trace it to the roots of the English word cohort.
quid \KWID\, noun:
1. A piece of something to be chewed but not swallowed.
2. One pound sterling.
Julius took the twist, wiped off his mouth with a loose male grin, and crammed a large quid into his cheek.
-- Thomas Wolfe, O Lost: A Story of the Buried Life
When he'd lost, he'd chew on his quid and spit in all directions . .
-- Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Death on the Installment Plan
Quid is a dialectal variant of the same word in Middle English that leads to cud, the stuff that cows chew.
glean \GLEEN\, verb:
1. To learn, discover, or find out, usually little by little or slowly.
2. To gather (grain or the like) after the reapers or regular gatherers.
3. To gather slowly and laboriously, bit by bit.
From what little I can glean, it's the edited journal of a voyage from Sydney to California by a notary of San Francisco named Adam Ewing.
-- David Mitchell, Cloud Atlas: a Novel
We all looked at each other, trying to glean something each from the other.
-- Bram Stoker, Dracula
Glean traces its origin back through Latin to the Celtic glan, "clean, pure." The sense "to learn or gather slowly" appears in English before the sense of "to gather grain left by the reapers."
franchise \FRAN-chahyz\, noun:
1. The right to vote.
2. A privilege of a public nature conferred on an individual,group, or company by a government.
One factor in the early mobilization of feminism was the 1832 Reform Act, through which women's exclusion from the franchise was formalized.
-- Angélique Richardson, Chris Willis, The new woman in fiction and in fact: fin-de-siècle feminisms
The national referendum of 1963 reflected general support for the six-point reform program, which included land reform and the franchise for women.
-- Robin Morgan, Sisterhood Is Global: The International Women's Movement Anthology -
Franchise derives from the Old French word for "freedom," which shares a root with the English frank.
climacteric \klahy-mak-TER-ik\, noun:
1. A critical period.
2. Physiology: a period of decrease of reproductive capacity in men and women, culminating, in women, in the menopause.
3. A year in which important changes in health, fortune, etc., are held by some theories to occur, as one's sixty-third year
4. The period of maximum respiration in a fruit, during which it becomes fully ripened.
Ernestine, who was the elder, asked one day, after her sister's visit had terminated in a climacteric of sisterly love, kisses, admonitions, and promises.
-- Jack London, The Grilling of Loren Ellery
I had reached an intellectual and artistic climacteric, a life climacteric of some sort.
-- Jack London, The Mutiny of the Elsinore
Climacteric originates in the Greek klimakter, "rung of a ladder."
siesta \see-ES-tuh\, noun:
A midday or afternoon rest or nap.
Among the Yangüesans it was customary for them and their teams to spend the siesta in places providing grass and water, and the spot where Don Quixote happened to be was very much to their liking.
-- Miguel De Cervantes, Don Quixote
At noon I closed the shop, but still I was reluctant to leave those three rooms filled with merchandise, and I lay down among some grain sacks to get through the heat of the siesta.
-- Isabel Allende, Eva Luna
While siesta is associated with Latin America, its origin is in the Latin sexta hōra, meaning "sixth hour," or noon
splendiferous \splen-DIF-er-uhs\, adjective:
Magnificent; fine.
"Then we'll build a charming villa, and plant a lovely garden round it, stuck all full of the most splendiferous tropical flowers, and we'll farm the land, plant, sow, reap, eat, sleep, and be merry."
-- R. M. Ballantyne, The Choral Island
[He] flew to the moon, thence back to earth and up the Orinoco impersonating a wild man but actually sound as a button, though no longer vulnerable, no longer mortal, a splendiferous hulk of a poem dedicated to the archipelago of insomnia.
-- Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn
Splendiferous is an elaboration of splendid, but owes its roots to the Latin splendere, "to shine," and ferre, "to bear."
canonize \KAN-uh-nahyz\, verb:
1. To glorify and honor.
2. Ecclesiastical. to place in the canon of saints.
3. To consider or treat as sacrosanct or holy.
She is a theme of honor and renown, a spur to valiant and magnanimous deeds, whose present courage may beat down our foes, and fame in time to come canonize us, for I presume brave Hector would not lose.
-- William Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida: Act 2, Scene 2
There are an awful lot of sanctimonious people out there who expect everyone else to canonize them because they're going around like hall monitors confiscating all the ashtrays.
-- Christopher Buckley, Thank You for Smoking: A Novel
The original meaning of canonize is "to place someone in the canon or calendar of saints." Canon relates to the Greek kannon, "a measuring rod."
beatitude \bee-AT-i-tood\, noun:
1. Supreme blessedness; exalted happiness.
2. Any of the declarations of blessedness pronounced by Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount.
Still, they were remarkable photographs, and what made them so was Perry's expression, his look of unflawed fulfillment, of beatitude, as though at last, and as in one of his dreams, a tall yellow bird had hauled him to heaven.
-- Truman Capote, In Cold Blood.
She stayed till Hannah came to take her home to dinner, but she had no appetite, and could only sit and smile upon everyone in a general state of beatitude.
-- Louisa May Alcott, Little Women
Beatitude derives from the Latin beatus, "happy, blessed," which in turn relates to the Latin prefix bene- "good."
lily-livered \LIL-ee-LIV-erd\, noun:
Weak or lacking in courage; cowardly; pusillanimous.
But surely, for your own sake, you will not be so lily-livered as to fall into this trap which he has baited for you and let him take the very bread out of your mouth without a struggle.
-- Anthony Trollope, Barchester Towers
He had skin as white as a lily, but he was not lily-livered; he was as strong as a champion at the Shrovetide games.
-- Geoffrey Chaucer and Peter Ackroyd, Canterbury Tales
Lily-livered was first used in English by Shakespeare in Macbeth. The liver was supposedly the seat of passion and was typically dark red or brown. Since a lily is pale and light-colored, a lily-livered person was weak and passionless
