fiddlesticks

fiddlesticks \FID-l-stiks\, interjection:

(used to express impatience, dismissal, etc.)

"...If he had been an English lad, he would have been off to his sweetheart long before this, without saying with your leave or by your leave; but being a Frenchman, he is all for Aeneas and filial piety,—filial fiddle-sticks!"
-- Elizabeth Gaskell, My Lady Ludlow, 1858

The lovers were fiddlesticks, he thought, collecting it all in his mind again. That's fiddlesticks, that's first-rate, he thought, putting one thing beside another. But he must read it again. He could not remember the whole shape of the thing.
-- Virginia Woolf, To the Lighthouse, 1927

Fiddlesticks came to English in the 1400s from the late Middle English term fidillstyk.

solstice

solstice \SOL-stis, SOHL-\, noun:

1. Astronomy. a. either of the two times a year when the sun is at its greatest distance from the celestial equator: about June 21, when the sun reaches its northernmost point on the celestial sphere, or about December 22, when it reaches its southernmost point. Compare summer solstice, winter solstice. b. either of the two points in the ecliptic farthest from the equator.
2. a furthest or culminating point; a turning point.

...the Sun appears a second time to be in the Plane of the Equinoctial Circle, in its Passage from the Winter Solstice to the SummerSolstice...
-- John Shuttleworth, A Treatise of Astronomy, 1738

The era, a purely astronomical division of time, began with the coincidence of the December solstice with perihelion, and was renewed every 25,765 years.
-- Camille Flammarion, Omega: The Last Days of the World, 1894

Solstice comes from the Latin solstitium referring to when the sun stands still. It entered English in the 1200s.

poultice

poultice \POHL-tis\, noun:

1. a soft, moist mass of cloth, bread, meal, herbs, etc., applied hot as a medicament to the body.

verb:
1. to apply a poultice to.

...he did not notice whether I was going to spike him or put on a poultice.
-- David Rattlehead, The Life and Adventures of an Arkansaw Doctor, 1851

"...I thought I could nurse her; I did my best. Was the poultice all right?"
-- George Moore, Spring Days: A Realistic Novel, 1888

Poultice came to English in the 1500s from the Latin puls meaning "porridge."

ambulate

ambulate \AM-byuh-leyt\, verb:

to walk about or move from place to place.

The woman walked slowly, with a halting gait, as if she'd been forced to ambulate with a pair of swim fins for shoes.
-- Sue Grafton, "E" is for Evidence, 1988

It must be admitted that we who ambulate in pants, lie to each other in business and bunco our neighbors, in order to secure the lithographs of commerce, so that we can furnish the gentle herd with the means to live, are not perfect.
-- Charles Summers, The Nomads, 1903

Ambulate comes from the Latin ambulāre meaning "to walk." It entered English in the 1600s.

transpontine

transpontine \trans-PON-tin, -tahyn\, adjective:

1. across or beyond a bridge.
2. on the southern side of the Thames in London.

There was nothing left but to retreat against the railing, and with my back turned to the street, pretend to be admiring the barges on the river or the chimneys of transpontine London.
-- Robert Louis Stevenson and Fanny Vandergrift, "Narrative of the Spirited Old Lady," More New Arabian Nights: The Dynamiter, 1885

...he had come straight from a wretched transpontine lodging to this splendid Lincolnshire mansion, and had at the same time exchanged a stipend of thirty shillings a week for an income of eleven thousand a year…"
-- Mary Elizabeth Braddon, John Marchmont's Legacy, 1862–1863

Transpontine comes from the Latin trans- + pont- meaning "across" + "bridge."

cathexis

cathexis \kuh-THEK-sis\, noun:

1. Psychoanalysis. the investment of emotional significance in an activity, object, or idea.
2. Psychoanalysis. the charge of psychic energy so invested.

She remembered so clearly the surprise of that first cathexis with Earth across the light-years…
-- Ian Watson, Very Slow Time Machine, 1979

Now our primary libidinal cathexis is with machines. Cars, power tools, computers, Kitchen Aids, audiophile equipment.
-- Curtis White, Requiem, 2001

Cathexis ultimately comes from the Proto-Indo-European root segh- meaning "to hold." It entered English in the 1920s.

klaxon

klaxon \KLAK-suhn\, noun:

a loud electric horn, formerly used on automobiles, trucks, etc., and now often used as a warning signal.

He invented the Klaxon, a horn that relied on electricity to vibrate a metal diaphragm, emitting a sound that was shrill yet guttural, abrupt yet unending, ugly yet lifesaving.
-- Julie M. Fenster, The Spirit of Invention, 2009

Everybody has heard a klaxon on a car suddenly begin to sound; I understand it is a short circuit that causes it.
-- James Thurber, "Let Your Mind Alone!," The New Yorker, 1937

Klaxon got its name from an American manufacturing company that made horns for automobiles. It entered English in the early 1900s.

misoneism

misoneism \mis-oh-NEE-iz-uhm, mahy-soh-\, noun:

hatred or dislike of what is new or represents change.

But it is necessary to note that hereditary anomaly, if it provokes an anomaly in the moral sense, also suppresses misoneism, the horror of novelty which is almost the general rule of humanity.
-- Joseph Conrad, The Secret Agent, 1907

...he saw he was the only one to stand ready for the new thing, because the others were all exhibiting symptoms of misoneism.
-- Brian Aldiss, Brian Aldiss, 1967

Misoneism comes from the Greek miso- + neos meaning "hatred" and "new."

whitherward

whitherward \HWITH-er-werd, WITH-\, adverb:

Archaic. toward what place; in what direction.

West, West! Whitherward point hope and prophet- fingers, whitherward at sunset kneel all worshipers of fire, whitherward in mid-ocean the great whales turn to die, whitherward face all the Moslem dead in Persia, whitherward lie Heaven and Hell!
-- Herman Melville, Mardi: And Voyage Thither, 1849

...the only question now was, Whitherward to vanish, in what hole to hide oneself!
-- Thomas Carlyle, The French Revolution, 1837

Whitherward comes from Old English hwinder + -weard meaning "toward where?"

umbriferous

umbriferous \uhm-BRIF-er-uhs\, adjective:

casting or making shade.

Its white umbriferous blooms cover fields, ditches, and anywhere it can.
-- Wesley Henry, A Pilgrim's Path, 2007

Every city front or rear yard should be ornamented with one or two of these fruitiferous and umbriferous trees.
-- George J. Drews, Unfired Foods and Hygienic Dietetics for Prophylactic (preventative) Feeding, 1909

Umbriferous comes from the Latin word umbra meaning "shade," and is related to the word "umbrella."

lipogram

lipogram \LIP-uh-gram, LAHY-puh-\, noun:

a written work composed of words chosen so as to avoid the use of one or more specific alphabetic characters.

I suddenly felt possessive of our boat, our game, a travel set with tiny magnetic letters. "Our board is missing a few tiles," I said. "Just makes it more of a challenge…a lipogram."
-- Gayle Brandeis, Delta Girls: A Novel, 2010

So the poet whose hunger is simply to speak—tell truths, right wrongs—what need has he for the lipogram, for colors of rhetoric, antilibrations of phrase on phrase?
-- John Gardner, Jason and Medeia, 1973

Lipogram entered English at the turn of the 18th century from the Greek lipográmmatos meaning "missing a letter."

cusp

cusp \kuhsp\, noun:

1. a point or pointed end.
2. Anatomy, Zoology, Botany. a point, projection, or elevation, as on the crown of a tooth.
3. Also called spinode. Geometry. a point where two branches of a curve meet, end, and are tangent.
4. Architecture. a decorative device, used especially in Gothic architecture to vary the outlines of intradoses or to form architectural foils, consisting of a pair of curves tangent to the real or imaginary line defining the area decorated and meeting at a point within the area.
5. Astronomy. a point of a crescent, especially of the moon.
6. Astrology. a. the zodiacal degree that marks the beginning of a house or a sign. b. Informal. a person born on the first day of a sign.
7. a point that marks the beginning of a change: on the cusp of a new era.

From behind the cusp a figure had stepped out, entirely black, unfolding slowly, as though from a crouch.
-- David Herter, Ceres Storm, 2000

"I have put your father into it! There are the initial letters W. C. let into the cusp of the York rose, and the date, three years before the battle of Bosworth, over the chimneypiece."
-- Baron Edward Bulwer-Lytton, The Caxtons: A Family Picture, 1849

Cusp came to English in the late 1500s from the Latin cuspis meaning "a point."

ochlophobia

ochlophobia \ok-luh-FOH-bee-uh\, noun:

Psychiatry. an abnormal fear of crowds.

"The man's got pedophobia, homichlophobia, dromophobia, xenophobia, ochlophobia, haphephobia, planomania, kleptophobia, thanatophobia, he's an onychophagist, he's got gerontophobia, but notice he has no dysphagia…"
-- George Friel, Mr. Alfred, M.A., 1972

As the plane leveled her discomfort ebbed. Agoraphobia. Demophobia. Enochlophobia. Ochlophobia. She knew the terms but refused to label her condition a phobia.
-- Rick Mofina, The Panic Zone, 2010

Ochlophobia entered English in the late 1800s from the Greek roots meaning "mob" and "fear."

calorifacient

calorifacient \kuh-lawr-uh-FEY-shuhnt, -lor-, kal-er-uh-\, adjective:

(of foods) producing heat.

The division of food into azotized and non-azotized is no doubt important, but the attempt to show that the first only is plastic or nutritive, while the second is simply calorifacient, or heat-producing, fails entirely in the face of the facts revealed by the study of man in different climates...
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, "Border Lines of Knowledge in Some Provinces of Medical Science," 1861

It has been attempted on the basis of their supposed physiological destination, and thus they were divided into the histogenetic and thecalorifacient substances; the one going, as was imagined, solely to the formation of tissue, and the other entirely to maintain the heat of the body.
-- William Alexander Hammond, A Treatise on Hygiene, 1863

Calorifacient comes from the Latin calōrifacĕre meaning "to make heat." It entered English in the mid-1800s.

hardihood

hardihood \HAHR-dee-hood\, noun:

1. boldness or daring; courage.
2. audacity or impudence.
3. strength; power; vigor: the hardihood of youth.
4. hardy spirit or character; determination to survive; fortitude: the hardihood of early settlers.

"...Make thee my knight? My knights are sworn to vows / Of utter hardihood, utter gentleness, / And, loving, utter faithfulness in love, / And uttermost obedience to the King."
-- Lord Alfred Tennyson, Idylls of the King, 1872

They had to do with a pride in a man's courage and hardihood, courage and hardihood that could make of thefts, of murder, of crimes dimly guessed, wrongs no more reprehensible than a boy's apple-stealing.
-- Dashiell Hammett, "Ruffian's Wife," 1925

Hardihood came to English in the 1600s from the Old French hardir meaning "to harden" or "to make bold." This ultimately comes from the Proto-Germanic hardjan meaning "to make hard."

jocose

jocose \joh-KOHS, juh-\, adjective:

given to or characterized by joking; jesting; humorous; playful: a jocose and amusing manner.

The jocose talk of hay-makers is best at a distance; like those clumsy bells round the cows' necks, it has rather a coarse sound when it comes close, and may even grate on your ears painfully...
-- George Eliot, Adam Bede, 1859

Lord Boardotrade was there, making semi-jocose speech, quite in the approved way for a cognate paterfamilias.
-- Anthony Trollope, Ayala's Angel, 1878

Jocose comes from the Latin jocōsus meaning "joking." It entered English in the 1600s.

abiogenesis

abiogenesis \ey-bahy-oh-JEN-uh-sis, ab-ee-oh-\, noun:

Biology. the now discredited theory that living organisms can arise spontaneously from inanimate matter; spontaneous generation.

"Aristotle would have loved that." Nancy was standing behind him. "Why Aristotle?" she asked. "He believed in abiogenesis, the idea that living creatures can arise from nonliving matter."
-- Tom Clancy, Games of State, 1996

Oberth, who accurately predicted rocket development on earth, suspects that the prerequisites for abiogenesis exist on other planets in the solar system.
-- Erich von Daniken, translated by Michael Heron, Chariots of the Gods? Unsolved Mysteries of the Past, 1968

Coined by T. H. Huxley in 1870, abiogenesis comes from the Latin words meaning "birth" and "origin."

slumgullion

slumgullion \sluhm-GUHL-yuhn, SLUHM-guhl-\, noun:

1. a stew of meat, vegetables, potatoes, etc.
2. a beverage made weak or thin, as watery tea, coffee, or the like.
3. the refuse from processing whale carcasses.
4. a reddish, muddy deposit in mining sluices.

"...d'yever eat good old fashioned slumgullion boy, 'taint nothin but scrambled eggs and potatoes all scrambled up together."
-- Jack Kerouac, The Dharma Bums, 1958

We could not eat the bread or the meat, nor drink the "slumgullion."
-- Mark Twain, Roughing It, 1872

Slumgullion is an Americanism dating back to the 1840s. It is perhaps related to the word cullion, which comes from the Latin term meaning "bag" or "testicle."

largesse

largesse \lahr-JES, LAHR-jis\, noun:

1. generous bestowal of gifts.
2. the gift or gifts, as of money, so bestowed.
3. Obsolete. generosity; liberality.

They subsisted by the bounty, or largesse, as it was called, of the princes whom they served, which was one great source of expense to those who embarked in war…
-- Sir Walter Scott, "Feudal Chivalry," Tales of a Grandfather, 1831

Largesse, in the form of odds and ends of cold cream and pomatum, and also of hairpins, was freely distributed among the attendants.
-- Charles Dickens, The Mystery of Edwin Drood, 1870

Largesse comes from the Latin largus meaning "abundant." It shares a root with the word large.

pokelogan

pokelogan \POHK-loh-guhn\, noun:

Northeastern U.S. marshy or stagnant water that has branched off from a stream or lake.

They were particularly numerous where there was a small bay, or pokelogan, as it is called, bordered by a strip of meadow, or separated from the river by a low peninsula covered with coarse grass...
-- Henry David Thoreau, The Maine Woods, 1864

He weighted their bodies into the black stagnant water of a marshy pokelogan and watched them sink below the surface, being the last man to ever see them alive or dead.
-- Robert Olmstead, Soft Water, 1988

Pokelogan entered English in the 1840s and is of unknown origin.

twain

twain \tweyn\, adjective:

two.

Here two gentlefolks whisper together, and there other twain, their swords by their side.
-- Charles Reade, The Cloister and the Hearth, 1861

Or one can say that East is East and West is West, and in American literature never the twain shall meet.
-- edited by Walter B. Rideout, Sherwood Anderson: A Collection of Critical Essays, 1974

Twain comes from the Old English twēgen, which is the masculine nomiative and accusative form of the word "two."

pilcrow

pilcrow \PIL-kroh\, noun:

a paragraph mark.

Take the trouble to look it up and in most cases the humble pilcrow warrants only a few lines, dismissed briskly as a "paragraph mark" that is "only important when brevity is important."
-- Keith Houston, Shady Characters: The Secret Life of Punctuation, Symbols, and Other Typographical Marks, 2013

I'm more like a specialized piece of punctuation, a cedilla, umlaut or pilcrow, hard to track down on the keyboard of a computer or typewriter.
-- Adam Mars-Jones, Pilcrow, 2008

Pilcrow arose in the 1400s, possibly from the Old French paragrafe meaning "paragraph."

suppletory

suppletory \SUHP-li-tawr-ee, -tohr-ee\, adjective:

supplying a deficiency.

Every constituent is bound by suppletory rules in the charter, but each constituent is free at any time to alter by contract how a particular suppletory rule will apply to its positions and interests.
-- David Sciulli, Corporate Power in Civil Society, 2001

A book of accounts kept by one who has since become insane, and proved to be in his handwriting, is admissible in evidence, on being verified by the suppletory oath of his guardian.
-- Massachusetts Digest, 1881

Suppletory comes from the Latin word supplēre meaning "to make complete."

wight

wight \wahyt\, adjective:

1. active; nimble.
2. strong and brave, especially in war.

noun:
1. a human being.
2. Obsolete. a. a supernatural being, as a witch or sprite. b. any living being; a creature.

Sir William of Deloraine, good at need / Mount thee on thy wightest steed; / Spare not to spur nor stint or ride / Until thou come to fair Tweedside…
-- Sir Walter Scott, The Lay of the Lady Minstrel, 1805

But if there happen to be an unduly slender, clumsy, or timorous wightin the ship, that wight is certain to be made a ship-keeper.
-- Herman Melville, Moby Dick; or, The Whale, 1851

Wight is related to the Old Norse word vīgr which meant "able to fight."