51吃瓜 of the Day
ahistorical
adjective
without concern for history or historical development; indifferent to tradition.
More about ahistorical
The formation of the adjective ahistorical is clear: the first syllable, a-, is a variety of the Greek prefix an-, a- 鈥渘ot鈥� (an-, a- is from the same Proto-Indo-European source as English un-). Historical is a derivative of Greek 丑颈蝉迟辞谤铆补 鈥渓earning or knowing by inquiry, history,鈥� a derivative of 丑铆蝉迟艒谤 鈥渙ne who knows or sees,鈥� akin to English wit and Latin 惫颈诲脓谤别 鈥渢o see,鈥� and the Latin suffix -al, with the general sense 鈥渙f the kind of, pertaining to, having the form or character of鈥� that named by the stem. Ahistorical entered English in the 20th century.
how is ahistorical used?
The notion that all human history 鈥� and all human societies 鈥� can be shoehorned into a simple binary scheme is not new … But it is always simplistic, ahistorical, and therefore wrong.
The boxlike room, stripped of all embellishment or parlor fussiness, a room that wished to be timeless or ahistorical, and there, in the middle of it, my deeply historical, timeworn grandmother.
logogriph
noun
an anagram, or a puzzle involving anagrams.
More about logogriph
A logogriph is a special kind of word puzzle in which a word, and other words formed from any or all of its letters, must be guessed from hints given in verses. 尝贸驳辞蝉 is well known in English: the first, most obvious of its many, many meanings is 鈥渨ord,鈥� as in the prologue to St. John鈥檚 Gospel: 鈥淚n the beginning was the 51吃瓜 (尝贸驳辞蝉).鈥� The combining form logo- is very common in Greek (e.g., 濒辞驳辞辫辞颈别卯苍 鈥渢o compose, write speeches,鈥� 濒辞驳辞辫谤补驳别卯苍 鈥渢o write copiously鈥�) and in English (e.g., logocentrism and logorrhea). The tricky word is 驳谤卯辫丑辞蝉 (its variant 驳谤卯辫辞蝉 shows it is not a native Greek word). 骋谤卯辫丑辞蝉 means 鈥�(woven) fishing basket, creel,鈥� and metaphorically 鈥渟omething intricate, dark saying, riddle; forfeit paid for failing to guess a riddle.鈥� 骋谤卯辫丑辞蝉 by itself would have been sufficient; adding the combining form logo- specifies its meaning. Logogriph entered English in the late 16th century.
how is logogriph used?
He was most anxious to secure for himself the priority of discovery, and yet he was unwilling to make a premature and possibly incorrect announcement. So he resorted to the ingenious device of a “logogriph,” or puzzle. It appears … as follows: aaaaaaa ccccc d eeeee g h iiiiiii llll mm nnnnnnnnn oooo pp q rr s ttttt uuuuu
That one man should have possessions beyond the capacity of extravagance to squander, and another, able and willing to work, should perish for want of embers, rags and a crust, renders society unintelligible. It makes the charter of human rights a logogriph.
rutilant
adjective
glowing or glittering with ruddy or golden light.
More about rutilant
It is one thing to see greatly varying descendants of Proto-Indo-European words in its daughter languages, as for instance in the very common (and easy to handle) Proto-Indo-European root bher-, bhor- 鈥渢o carry, bear, bear children,鈥� which appears as bhar- in Sanskrit, pher- in Greek, fer- in Latin, and ber- in Slavic, Armenian, and Germanic (English bear). It is another thing to see wildly variant forms of a Proto-Indo-European root within one language, but Latin offers a good example from the Proto-Indo-European root reudh-, roudh-, rudh- 鈥渞ed.鈥� (The root variant roudh- becomes raud- in Germanic, 谤脓补诲 in Old English (the 脓补 is a diphthong from au) and red in English.) Roudh- is also the source of Latin 谤奴蹿耻蝉, a dialect word meaning 鈥渞ed, tawny鈥� and also a proper name 鈥淩ed鈥� (rufous and Rufus in English). Roudh- also yields Latin 谤艒产耻蝉 鈥渞ed (of oxen and other animals),” 谤艒产耻谤 鈥渙ak, red oak” (the adjective 谤艒产耻蝉tus “of oak, oaken, strong鈥� becomes robust in English). The root variant rudh- yields Latin ruber 鈥渞别诲,鈥� rutilus 鈥済lowing red,鈥� with its derivative verb 谤耻迟颈濒腻谤别 “to glow with a bright red or golden color,鈥� whose present participle stem rutilant- becomes English rutilant. Rutilant entered English in the 15th century.
how is rutilant used?
Sometimes, when reading one of his works, I wonder whether Mr. Lawrence has not mistaken his medium, and whether it is not a painter he ought to have been, so significant is for him the slaty opalescence of the heron’s wing and so rutilant the death of the sun.
She looks up occasionally, between cross stitches, to gaze upon the steady stream of tourists stopping to admire the rutilant, shimmering sandstone folds unfurling 4,000 feet below.