travail (noun | truh-VAI
What It Means
Travail is a formal word, usually used in plural, that refers to a difficult experience or situation.
// The book describes the political travails of the governor during her first year in office.
Did You Know?
Travail traces back to trepalium, a Late Latin word for an instrument of torture. We don't know exactly what a trepalium looked like, but the word's history gives us an idea. Trepalium comes from the Latin adjective tripalis, which means "having three stakes" (from tri-, meaning "three," and palus, meaning "stake"). Trepalium eventually led to the Anglo-French verb travailler, meaning "to torment" but also, more mildly, "to trouble" and "to journey." The Anglo-French noun travail was borrowed into English in the 13th century, along with another descendant of travailler, travel.
My first thought with trepalium is that it looks close to trepanning.
@IronLemon I didn't notice that, but now that you mention it, it makes sense
nonchalant (adjective | nahn-shuh-LAHNT)
Someone described as nonchalant is relaxed and calm, either because they do not care about something or because they are not worried about something. Nonchalant can also be used to describe something, such as demeanor or behavior, that expresses such relaxed, calm unconcern.
// The team showed a somewhat nonchalant attitude at the beginning of the season, but they became more serious once the championship was within reach.
Since nonchalant ultimately comes from words meaning "not" and "be warm," it's no surprise that the word is all about keeping one's cool. Nonchalant’s Old French ancestor is the verb nonchaloir, meaning "to disregard," which combines non-, meaning "not," with chaloir, meaning "to concern." Chaloir in turn traces back to the Latin calēre, meaning "to be warm" (calēre is also the forerunner of the heat-related English word calorie). You might assume that the prefix non- implies the existence of an antonymous chalant, but no such word has developed in English. It’s no big deal though—if you want a word that means the opposite of nonchalant, both concerned and interested can do the job.
@Adragayle I’m enjoying your posts. Language is always fascinating (another word with an interesting history 😇) as it evolves and can be used for both direct and forthright communication, as well as the most nuanced and subtle insinuations.
Just curious if you ever browse websites like urban dictionary to see how slang is evolving and entering more common usage?
@Adragayle, I second @lovingspoonfull's post
@lovingspoonfull @GuyverGordon Happy to hear that, thank you! I agree, I've always had a fascination for words. It's so interesting to learn where they came from and how they've evolved into their current usage. I have looked up various words in sites like urban dictionary on occasion, usually when I can't find it in regular dictionaries and there were times when that one word led me into a time sink of exploring more words on the site. So many words, so little time
Sunday April 27 Word of the day:
decimate (verb | DESS-uh-mayt)
Decimate can mean both “to destroy a large number of (plants, animals, people, etc.)” or “to severely damage or destroy a large part of (something).”
// The bay’s lobsters have been decimated by disease.
// Budget cuts have decimated public services throughout the state.
Decimate is a word that often raises hackles, at least those belonging to a small but committed group of logophiles who feel that it is commonly misused. The issue that they have with the decline and fall of the word decimate is that once upon a time in ancient Rome it had a very singular meaning: “to select by lot and kill every tenth man of a military unit.” However, many words in English descended from Latin have changed and/or expanded their meanings in their travels. For example, we no longer think of sinister as meaning “on the left side,” and delicious can describe things both tasty and delightful. Was the “to kill every tenth man” meaning the original use of decimate in English? Yes, but not by much. It took only a few decades for decimate to acquire its broader, familiar meaning of “to severely damage or destroy,” which has been employed steadily since the 17th century.
alacrity (noun | uh-LAK-ruh-tee)
Alacrity refers to a quick and cheerful readiness to do something.
// She accepted the invitation to go on the trip with an alacrity that surprised her parents, who had assumed she wouldn’t be interested.
“I have not that alacrity of spirit / Nor cheer of mind that I was wont to have,” says William Shakespeare’s King Richard III in the play that bears his name. Alas and alack, Richard! Alacrity comes from the Latin word alacer, meaning “lively” or “eager,” and suggests physical quickness coupled with eagerness or enthusiasm. Thus, a spirit that lacks alacrity—like Richard III’s—is in the doldrums, in need of a little (to use a much less formal word than alacrity) get-up-and-go.
furtive (adjective | FER-tiv)
Furtive describes something that is done in a quiet and secret way to avoid being noticed. It can also mean "expressive of stealth" or "sly" (as in "a furtive look"), or "obtained underhandedly" (as in "furtive gains").
// We exchanged furtive smiles across the table, carefully not to attract the teacher's attention.
You can’t steal someone’s heart without capturing their attention, nor can you steal someone’s thunder without hijacking their audience’s attention. But attention is something most thieves would rather avoid; whether stealing a glance or a diamond, one must be furtive or risk getting caught in the act. When first used in written English in the early 1600s, furtive meant "done by stealth." It later adopted the less common meaning "stolen" or "obtained underhandedly." Whichever meaning you choose, the word has a fittingly elusive ancestry, either stepping into English via the French furtif or coming directly from that word's ancestor, the Latin furtivus, itself a descendent of fur, meaning "thief."
insouciance (noun | in-SOO-see-unss)
Insouciance is a formal word that refers to a feeling of carefree unconcern. It can also be understood as a word for the relaxed and calm state of a person who is not worried about anything.
// The young actor charmed interviewers with his easy smile and devil-may-care insouciance.
If you were alive and of whistling age in the late 1980s or early 1990s, chances are you whistled (and snapped your fingers, and tapped your toes) to a little ditty called “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” by Bobby McFerrin, an a cappella reggae-jazz-pop tune that took the charts by surprise and by storm. An ode to cheerful insouciance if ever there was one, its lyrics are entirely concerned with being entirely unconcerned, remaining trouble-free in the face of life’s various stressors and calamities. Such carefree nonchalance is at the heart of insouciance, which arrived in English (along with the adjective insouciant), from French, in the 1800s. The French word comes from a combining of the negative prefix in- with the verb soucier, meaning “to trouble or disturb.” The easiness and breeziness of insouciance isn’t always considered beautiful, however. Insouciance may also be used when someone’s lack of concern for serious matters is seen as more careless than carefree.
convoluted (adjective | KAHN-vuh-loo-tud)
Something described as convoluted is very complicated and difficult to understand, or has many curves and turns.
// The speaker’s argument was so convoluted that most of the audience had trouble determining whether they were for or against the new policy.
// The route from the airport to the village was long and convoluted.
If you’ve ever felt your brain twisting itself into a pretzel while trying to follow a complicated or hard-to-follow line of reasoning, you’ll appreciate the relative simplicity of the adjective convoluted, which is perfect for describing head-scratchers (and pretzel-makers). Convoluted traces back to the Latin verb convolvere, meaning “to roll up, coil, or twist.” Originally, convoluted (like its predecessor in English, the verb convolute) was used in the context of things having literal convolutions—in other words, twisty things like intestines or a ram’s horns. Over time it expanded to figuratively describe things like arguments, plots, stories, logic, etc., that are intricate or feature many twists and turns that make them difficult to understand.
ziggurat (noun | ZIG-uh-rat)
A ziggurat is an ancient Mesopotamian temple consisting of a pyramidal structure built in successive stages with outside staircases and a shrine at the top. The word ziggurat is also sometimes used for a similarly shaped structure.
// Ancient ziggurats were always built with a core of mud brick and an exterior covered with baked brick. They had no internal chambers and were usually square or rectangular.
French professor of archaeology François Lenormant spent a great deal of time poring over ancient Assyrian texts. In those cuneiform inscriptions, he pieced together a long-forgotten language, now known as Akkadian, which proved valuable to our understanding of the ancient civilization. Through his studies, he became familiar with the Akkadian word for Mesopotamia’s towering, stepped temples: ziqqurratu, which stepped into English as ziggurat.
MAY MAGIC 🪄
sleuth (verb | SLOOTH)
To sleuth is to carefully or methodically search for information, or to act as a detective.
// We spent hours at the flea market sleuthing for 19th century paintings.
"They were the footprints of a gigantic hound!" Those canine tracks in Arthur Conan Doyle's The Hound of the Baskervilles set the great Sherlock Holmes sleuthing on the trail of a murderer. It was a case of art imitating etymology. When Middle English speakers first borrowed sleuth from the Old Norse word slōth, the term referred to the track of an animal or person. In Scotland, sleuth hund referred to a kind of bloodhound used to hunt game or track down fugitives from justice. In 19th-century U.S. English, sleuthhound, soon shortened to sleuth, began to be used for a detective. From there, sleuth slipped into verb use to apply to what a sleuth does.
risible (adjective | RIZZ-uh-bul)
Risible is a formal word used disapprovingly to describe things that deserve to be mocked or laughed at because they are absurd or unreasonable.
// Although the teachers derided the students’ slang as risible nonsense, the same had been said about their own generation’s lingo.
Say “cheese”! Now say thank you to the risorius muscles near the corners of your mouth for helping you smile. You might find this exercise a bit ridiculous—risible, even—but we’re here to explain that there is no need for derision; it’s for a wordy reason. Risible, ridiculous, derision, and risorius all come from the Latin verb ridēre, meaning “to laugh.” This etymology helps make the meaning of risible clear; something is described as risible (such as saying “cheese” out loud to yourself while looking at your phone/computer) when it arouses or provokes laughter. But just as its synonym laughable often describes things deserving not just of laughter but of eye-rolling scorn, risible is frequently applied to that which merits both sneer and chortle, scoff and guffaw. Words are funny like that.
@Adragayle It’s funny how some words can even sound like their meaning. Risible almost feels like you’ll sneer when saying it, and the very sound will be embodied with that sentiment.
@lovingspoonfull sometimes it's a perfect construct, lol
plethora (noun | PLETH-uh-ruh)
Plethora refers to a very large amount or number of something. Plethora is most often used in the phrase "a plethora of."
// The hotel offers a plethora of amenities, including indoor and outdoor pools, a fitness center, and world-class dining.
Plethora was first used in English to refer to a medical condition marked by an excess volume of blood or other bodily fluid, with associated swelling and redness. (Its Greek ancestor, the noun plēthṓra, refers to a similar excess, or to general fullness or crowdedness.) These days, plethora is most often used in general contexts to refer to a large number or amount of something. While plethora conveys a plural meaning, it is a grammatically singular word, which makes choosing whether to pair it with a singular or plural verb confusing. Both can be correctly used, however; choose the singular if you wish to emphasize the grouping or collection ("a plethora of books is available"), and choose the plural if you wish to emphasize the individual elements or components ("a plethora of books have been written on the subject").