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51勛圖 of the Day

51勛圖 of the day

guerdon

[ gur-dn ] [ gr dn ] Show IPA Phonetic Respelling

noun

a reward, recompense, or requital.

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More about guerdon

Guerdon a reward, recompense, or requital is a variation of Old French werdoun, continuing a trend in which the w in Germanic-origin borrowings often becomes gu when adapted into French and other Romance languages. For other examples, compare the cognate pairs ward and guard, warranty and guarantee, and William and Guillaume. Old French werdoun comes from Medieval Latin widerdonum, which in turn was adapted from Old High German 滄勳餃硃娶梭紳, with a phonetic change from l to d because of the influence of Latin 餃紳喝鳥 g勳款喧. 兜勳餃硃娶梭紳 is a compound of widar again, back (which survives today in the German expression auf Wiedersehen until we meet again) and 梭紳 reward (cognate to Latin lucrum gain, profit, as in English lucrative). Guerdon was first recorded in English in the mid-14th century.

how is guerdon used?

What a Cannes Film Festival. It has been an unruly jungle. Unruly and luxuriant. The movies have climbed over each other in excellence, every new one transcending the last as it reaches towards that gilded guerdon, that light-giving cynosure of legendary tree-forms, the Palme dOr.

Nigel Andrews, Cannes Film Festival: Assayas, Jarmusch and Almod籀var shine, Financial Times, May 19, 2016

BIRON. When tongues speak sweetly, then they name her name, And Rosaline they call her: ask for her; And to her white hand see thou do commend This seal’d-up counsel. There’s thy guerdon; go.
[giving [Costard] a shilling]

William Shakespeare, Loves Labours Lost, c. mid-1590s

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disjecta membra

[ dis-jek-tuh mem-bruh ] [ d阞sdk t mm br ] Show IPA Phonetic Respelling

plural noun

scattered members; disjointed portions or parts.

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More about disjecta membra

Disjecta membra disjointed portions or parts is a term from Latin that is altered from the phrase 餃勳莽轍梗釵喧蘋 membra 梯棗襲喧硃梗 limbs of a dismembered poet, which appears in the writings of Horace (known to his Roman contemporaries as Quintus Horatius Flaccus). The reason for the spelling change is simple grammar: in the original Latin, the possessive adjective 餃勳莽轍梗釵喧蘋 dismembered matches the possessive noun 梯棗襲喧硃梗 of a poet. The endings are different because 梯棗襲喧硃梗 is irregular; though it looks feminine with its -ae ending, it is in fact a masculine noun. With 梯棗襲喧硃梗 removed from the phrase, 餃勳莽轍梗釵喧蘋 changes to match the neuter subject noun membra, becoming disjecta. Even in modern Spanish, the feminine-looking noun poeta poet is still masculine, and typical masculine -o adjectives modify it. Disjecta membra was first recorded in English in the early 18th century.

how is disjecta membra used?

One gets the notion that these boys are starting again from the beginning, with the separate tone and the separate sonority. Notes are strewn about like disjecta membra; there is an end to continuity in the old sense and an end of thematic relationships. In this music one waits to hear what will happen next without the slightest idea what will happen, or why what happened did happen once it has happened.

Aaron Copland, The Pleasures of Music, an address at the University of New Hampshire, April 16, 1959

As she led the way westward past a long line of areas which, through the distortion of their paintless rails, revealed with increasing candour the disjecta membra of bygone dinners, Lily felt that Rosedale was taking contemptuous note of the neighbourhood; and before the doorstep at which she finally paused he looked up with an air of incredulous disgust.

Edith Wharton, The House of Mirth, 1905

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paludal

[ puh-lood-l, pal-yuh-dl ] [ plud l, p疆l y dl ] Show IPA Phonetic Respelling

adjective

of or relating to marshes.

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More about paludal

Paludal of or relating to marshes is based on Latin 梯硃梭贖莽 (stem 梯硃梭贖餃-) swamp, marsh, plus the adjectival suffix -al. 捩硃梭贖莽 has one of several possible origins, inspiring significant debate among linguists. One common hypothesis is that 梯硃梭贖莽 originally meant submerged, filled (with water) and derives from an Indo-European root meaning to fill; many, which would make it related to Latin 梯梭襲紳喝莽 full (as in plenty) and 梯梭襲娶梗 to fill (as in complete) as well as cognate to English fill because of Grimms law; learn more from the recent 51勛圖s of the Day pruinose and cordiform. Alternatively, 梯硃梭贖莽 could be connected to terms related to movement of water, from Latin pluere to rain (compare French pleuvoir and Spanish llover) and Latin 梯梭娶櫻娶梗 to weep (compare French pleurer and Spanish llorar) to English fleet, float, flood, flotsam, and flow. Paludal was first recorded in English in the 1810s.

how is paludal used?

A church, an ancient heap of flints, rises up, cavernous, through mist and marshes. The Cathedral of the Marshes, they call it. This is Blythburgh on Englands windswept Suffolk coast. The landscape here is oppressive, bleak. And what man once made is quickly being lost to nature: sea erodes land …. Victorian antiquaries restored the place to something of its former glory. But today, few come to worship in Blythburghs paludal c硃喧堯梗餃娶硃梭.

Miles Pattenden, If I could go anywhere: the cathedral at Blythburgh that rises from the marshes," Conversation, June 24, 2021

The land we were standing on was a project technically known as BA-39 …. BA-39 had proved, not that further proof was really necessary, what enough pipes and pumps and diesel fuel can accomplish. Nearly a million cubic yards of sediment had made the five-mile journey, resulting in the creationor, to be more accurate, the re-creationof a hundred and eighty-six paludal acres. Here were all the benefits of flooding without the messy side effects…

Elizabeth Kolbert, "Louisianas Disappearing Coast," The New Yorker, April 1, 2019

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