Hale

 WORD OF THE DAY

hale / adjective / HAIL

Definition

1: free from defect, disease, or infirmity 

2: sound

3: retaining exceptional health and vigor

Examples

"Uncle Charles was a hale old man with a well tanned skin, rugged features and white side whiskers." 

— James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, 1916

"Buying healthy, thriving plants is as much art as science. But knowing what to look for when you buy your spring plants is one of the best ways to get your garden off to a good start. Starting with hale and hearty plants is one of the 'secrets' of successful gardeners." 

— Rob Howard, The Hamilton (Ontario, Canada) Mountain News, 6 May 2018

Did You Know?

English has two words hale: the adjective that is frequently paired with hearty to describe those healthy and strong, and the somewhat uncommon verb that has to do with literal or figurative hauling or pulling. 

One can hale a boat onto shore, or hale a person into a courtroom with the aid of legal ramifications for resistance. 

The verb comes from Middle English halen, also root of our word haul, but the adjective has a bifurcated origin, with two Middle English terms identified as sources, hale and hail. 

Both of those come from words meaning "healthy," the former from Old English hāl, and the latter from Old Norse heill. 

Middle English hail is also the source of the three modern English words hail (the verb, interjection, and noun) that have to do with greeting.

Dessicate

 WORD OF THE DAY

desiccate / verb / DESS-ih-kayt

Definition
1: to dry up or become dried up
2a: to preserve (a food) by drying
2b: dehydrate
3: to drain of emotional or intellectual vitality

Examples
"Horticultural oils work by smothering insect and mite pests/eggs, and in breaking down their protective coatings, causing them to desiccate (dry out)."
— Bracken Henderson, The Preston (Idaho) Citizen, 28 Apr. 2021

"A title like 'pungent dins concentric' conjures minor Language poetry circa 1986, but Vanessa Couto Johnson's debut couldn't be less desiccated. Her strophic prose unfolds at a synaptic pace…."
— Michael Robbins, The Chicago Tribune, 11 Dec. 2018

Did You Know?
Raisins are desiccated grapes; they're also dehydrated grapes. And yet, a close look at the etymologies of desiccate and dehydrate raises a tangly question.
In Latin siccus means "dry," whereas the Greek stem hydr- means "water."
So how could it be that desiccate and dehydrate are synonyms? The answer is in the multiple identities of the prefix de-.
It may look like the same prefix, but the de- in desiccate means "completely, thoroughly," as in despoil ("to spoil utterly") or denude ("to strip completely bare").
The de- in dehydrate, on the other hand, means "remove," the same as it does in defoliate ("to strip of leaves") or in deice ("to rid of ice").

Whilom

 WORD OF THE DAY

whilom / adjective / WYE-lum

Definition
: former

Examples
"On the eastern side settlement and agriculture have all but obliterated the whilom tallgrass prairie, so that it is hardly visible to anyone who would not seek it out on hands and knees...."
— William Least Heat-Moon, PrairyErth, 1991

"Alamo project leadership dropped its plan to move the cenotaph after the [Texas Historical Commission] denied the relocation last year…. [General Land Office] Commissioner George P. Bush, a whilom supporter of the move, laid fears of relocation to rest earlier this year as San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg shuffled committee leadership to adapt to the new plan."
— Isaiah Mitchell, The Texan (Austin, Texas), 30 Mar. 2021

Did You Know?
Whilom shares an ancestor with the word while. Both trace back to the Old English word hwīl, meaning "time" or "while."
In Old English hwīlum was an adverb meaning "at times."
This use passed into Middle English (with a variety of spellings, one of which was whilom), and in the 12th century the word acquired the meaning "formerly."
The adverb's usage dwindled toward the end of the 19th century, and it has since been labeled archaic.
The adjective first appeared on the scene in the 15th century, with the now-obsolete meaning "deceased," and by the 19th century it was being used with the meaning "former."
It's a relatively uncommon word, but it does see occasional use.

Affluent

 WORD OF THE DAY 

affluent / adjective / AF-loo-unt

Definition
1a: having an abundance of goods or riches
1b: wealthy
2: flowing in abundance

Examples
"When people got their stimulus checks at the start of the pandemic, charities saw a spike in charitable giving. Many affluent people not impacted by the economic downturn were also quick to donate."
— Robin Young and Serena McMahon, WBUR.org (Boston, Massachusetts), 26 Nov. 2020

"Princeton packs many charms into its 18.4 square miles. Halfway between New York and Philadelphia, it has long attracted affluent professionals, many enduring commutes of more than an hour in return for roomy, historic houses, old-growth trees that burst into flower in spring and the cultural riches of Princeton University."
— Julie Lasky, The New York Times, 21 Apr. 2021

Did You Know?
Visualize with us: coffers overflowing, a cash flow more than adequate, assets that are fluid. The image conjured is the essence of the word affluent.
Based on Latin fluere, meaning "to flow," affluent is all about flow. The same image is echoed in other fluere descendants, such as confluence, fluctuate, fluid, influence, mellifluous, and superfluous.
The flowing of goods or riches wasn't the word's first purview, however; 16th century print examples of affluent tend to be about the abundance of such intangibles as "goodness" and "spirit."
In the 17th century, the flow suggested by affluent varied greatly: streams, poisons, estates, and blood were all described with the word.
In modern use, affluent most often describes wealthy people, or places where wealthy people live.

Forswear

 WORD OF THE DAY

forswear / verb / for-SWAIR

Definition
1: to make a liar of (oneself) under or as if under oath
2a: to reject or renounce under oath
2b: to renounce earnestly
3: to deny under oath
4: to swear falsely

Examples
"The first instance of oath-taking is common in our everyday lives. Most weddings feature a couple forswearing all others, pledging fidelity to each other as long as they live. Witnesses in a courtroom (or Senate and House hearings) place their hands on a Bible and 'swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.'" 
— William Shaw, The Pilot (Southern Pines, North Carolina), 6 Mar. 2021

"All jobs, for the most part, within qualifying companies are subsidized. And, other than the limits on executive compensation, there are no restrictions on how companies spend their subsidy payments, including no requirement to forswear layoffs."
— Patrick Brethour, The Globe and Mail (Canada), 14 May 2021

Did You Know?
Forswear (which is also sometimes spelled foreswear) is the modern English equivalent of Old English forswerian.
It can suggest denial:
"[Thou] would'st forswear thy own hand and seal" — John Arbuthnot, John Bull
It can suggest perjury:
"Is it the interest of any man … to lie, forswear himself, indulge hatred, seek desperate revenge, or do murder?" — Charles Dickens, American Notes
But in current use, it most often has to do with giving something up, as in "The feuding parties agreed to forswear violence" and "She refused to forswear her principles."

Emeritus

 WORD OF THE DAY

emeritus / adjective / ih-MEH-ruh-tus

Definition
1: holding after retirement an honorary title corresponding to that held last during active service
2: retired from an office or position

Examples
Following her retirement after 35 years of teaching, Dr. Stevens will remain affiliated with the university as a professor emeritus.

"She started her career in 1980 at Goodwill Industries of Greater Detroit, and retired as CEO Emeritus in 2018…."
— Melissa Frick, MLive.com (Michigan), 18 May 2021

Did You Know?
In Latin, emeritus was used to describe soldiers who had completed their duty.
It is the past participle of the verb emereri, meaning "to serve out one's term," from the prefix e-, meaning "out," and merēre, "to earn, deserve, or serve."
Merēre is also the source of our word merit.
English speakers claimed emeritus as their own in the late 17th century, applying it as both a noun and an adjective referring or relating not to soldiers but to someone who is retired from professional life but permitted to keep as an honorary title the rank of the last office they held.
The adjective is frequently used postpositively—that is, after the noun it modifies rather than before it—and it is most commonly used to describe specifically those retired from a professorship.

Miasma

 WORD OF THE DAY

miasma / noun / mye-AZ-muh

Definition
1a: a vaporous exhalation formerly believed to cause disease
1b: a heavy vaporous emanation or atmosphere
2a: an influence or atmosphere that tends to deplete or corrupt; also : an atmosphere that obscures
2b: fog

Examples
"A number of giant companies like Microsoft and Google have tried to streamline the consumer health experience, while many others have been part of digitizing the back end, but it's still a miasma of confusion. The pandemic only underscored the poor state of the country's health services."
— Kara Swisher, The New York Times, 20 Apr. 2021

"While Fresh Kills was an environmental disaster, too—it produced methane gas, leaked millions of gallons of leachate into the groundwater, … and exuded a miasma of foul odors—the opposition to incineration cemented the landfill's vital role in the city's trash system."
— Robin Kaiser-Schatzlein, The New Yorker, 24 Apr. 2021

Did You Know?
In notes taken during a voyage to South America on the HMS Beagle in the 1830s, Charles Darwin described an illness that he believed was caused by "miasma" emanating from stagnant pools of water.
For him, miasma had the same meaning that it did when it first appeared in English in the 1600s: an emanation of a vaporous disease-causing substance.
Miasma comes from Greek miainein, meaning "to pollute."
But while Darwin was at sea, broader applications of miasma were starting to spread.
Nowadays, we know germs are the source of infection, so we're more likely to use the newer, more figurative sense of miasma, which refers to something destructive or demoralizing that surrounds or permeates.

Inveigle

 WORD OF THE DAY

inveigle / verb / in-VAY-gul

Definition
1a: to win over by wiles 
1b: entice
2a: to acquire by ingenuity or flattery
2b: wangle

Examples
"Maybe she and Terfel, … whose trajectory into the upper ranks of opera began in 1989 after winning the Lieder Prize at the BBC Cardiff Singer of the World, felt a certain kinship. Either way, after their first meeting she inveigled him into fundraising performances and concerts…."
— Henry Bourne, The Daily Telegraph (London), 20 Feb. 2021

"Yet another feather in Channel 5's home-grown drama cap, this intriguing four-parter should satisfy mystery fans perhaps unfulfilled by ITV's Finding Alice. Halfpenny excels as the obsessed mother, inveigling her way into the lives of the boy and his father."
— Gerard Gilbert, i (inews.co.uk), 1 Feb. 2021

Did You Know?
Inveigle, a word that dates from the 16th century, refers to the act of using clever talk, trickery, or flattery either to persuade somebody to do something or to obtain something, but etymologically the word is linked to eyesight—or the lack thereof.
Inveigle came to English from the Anglo-French verb enveegler, meaning "to blind or hoodwink someone," from the adjective enveugle, meaning "blind."
Enveugle derives from the Medieval Latin ab oculis, a phrase which literally translates to "lacking eyes."

Calumny

 WORD OF THE DAY

calumny / noun / KAL-um-nee

Definition
1: a misrepresentation intended to harm another's reputation
2: the act of uttering false charges or misrepresentations maliciously calculated to harm another's reputation

Examples
"[Heinrich von Kleist] sets his novella in the 14th century, when duelling was seen as a trial by battle in which the 'Judgment of God' would prevail. A murder, a wronged noblewoman, shame, calumny, castles, a melodramatic ending, Kleist's story pulls together all the key elements of the genre."
— Dan Glaister, The Guardian (London), 12 May 2021

"Almost without exception I find the exchanges on this page to be polite and well-reasoned. However, recently there was a series of letters that made my blood boil. How could so many seemingly reasonable people be so wrongheaded? I am speaking, of course, of the exchange of views on Brussels sprouts. I'm sure many of you were equally taken aback. How could such a wonderful food be the object of such vile calumnies?"
— Russ Parsons, The Irish Times, 6 Feb.2021

Did You Know?
Calumny made an appearance in these famous words from William Shakespeare's Hamlet:
"If thou dost marry, I'll give thee this plague for thy dowry: be thou chaste as ice, as pure as snow, thou shalt not escape calumny. Get thee to a nunnery, go."
The word had been in the English language for a while, though, before Hamlet uttered it.
It first entered English in the 15th century and comes from the Middle French word calomnie of the same meaning.
Calomnie, in turn, derives from the Latin word calumnia, (meaning "false accusation," "false claim," or "trickery"), which itself traces to the Latin verb calvi, meaning "to deceive."

Harry

 WORD OF THE DAY

harry / verb / HAIR-ee

Definition
1a: to make a pillaging or destructive raid on
1b: assault
2: to force to move along by harassing
3: to torment by or as if by constant attack

Examples
Seven-year-old Kaitlyn harried her little sister with pokes, hair pulling, and teasing, badgering her until she burst into tears.

"There was little puck support in either zone. The Rangers were pinned for shifts at a time and were harried into turnovers while unable to apply more than token pressure in the offensive zone."
— Larry Brooks, The New York Post, 20 Apr. 2021

Did You Know?
Was there once a warlike man named Harry who is the source for the English verb the name mirrors?
One particularly belligerent Harry does come to mind: William Shakespeare once described how "famine, sword, and fire" accompanied "the warlike Harry," England's King Henry the Fifth.
But neither this king nor any of his namesakes are the source for the verb harry.
Rather, harry (or a word resembling it) has been a part of English for as long as there has been anything that could be called English.
It took the form hergian in Old English and harien in Middle English, passing through numerous variations before finally settling into its modern spelling.
The word's Old English ancestors are related to Old High German words heriōn ("to devastate or plunder") and heri ("host, army").

Virtuoso

 WORD OF THE DAY

virtuoso / noun / ver-choo-OH-soh

Definition
1a: one who excels in the technique of an art
1b: a highly skilled musical performer (as on the violin)
2a: an experimenter or investigator especially in the arts and sciences
2b: savant
3: one skilled in or having a taste for the fine arts
4: a person who has great skill at some endeavor

Examples
"Perhaps most captivating is the sheer range of strange, delicate and piercing sounds the brilliant Bjarke Mogensen draws from the accordion; who needs synthesizers when you have this virtuoso in your ensemble?
— The New York Times, 6 May 2021

"But a true original style is never achieved for its own sake: a man may pay from a shilling to a guinea, according to his means, to see, hear, or read another man's act of genius; but he will not pay with his whole life and soul to become a mere virtuoso in literature, exhibiting an accomplishment which will not even make money for him, like fiddle playing."
— George Bernard Shaw, Man and Superman, 1905

Did You Know?
English speakers borrowed the Italian noun virtuoso in the 1600s, but the Italian word had a former life as an adjective meaning both "virtuous" and "skilled."
The first virtuosos (the English word can be pluralized as either virtuosos or, in the image of its Italian forbear, as virtuosi) were individuals of substantial knowledge and learning ("great wits," to quote one 17th-century clergyman).
The word was then transferred to those skilled in the arts and to skilled musicians, specifically.
In time, English speakers broadened virtuoso to apply to a person adept in any pursuit.

Fealty

 WORD OF THE DAY

fealty / noun / FEE-ul-tee

Definition
1a: the fidelity of a vassal or feudal tenant to his lord
1b: the obligation of such fidelity
2: intense fidelity

Examples
"Ordinary English soccer fans dispatched the Super League with a populist putsch even before it had scheduled its first game. Those fans went into the streets, demonstrating loudly and insisting they would abandon teams to which they had professed lifelong fealty."
— Kevin Cullen, The Boston Globe, 22 Apr. 2021

"Bathed in a laid-back marinade and wrapped in a cloak of smoke, the Niman Ranch Prime skirt steaks are cooked meticulously medium-rare, in the house style—a small miracle in itself, and one of the reasons for my fealty.
— Alison Cook, The Houston Chronicle, 5 May 2021

Did You Know?
In The Use of Law, published posthumously in 1629, Francis Bacon wrote, "Fealty is to take an oath upon a book, that he will be a faithful Tenant to the King."
That's a pretty accurate summary of the early meaning of fealty. Early forms of the term were used in Middle English around 1300, when they specifically designated the loyalty of a vassal to a lord.
Eventually, the meaning of the word broadened.
Fealty can be paid to a country, a principle, or a leader of any kind—though the synonyms fidelity and loyalty are more commonly used.
Fealty comes from the Anglo-French word feelté, or fealté, which comes from the Latin fidelitas, meaning "fidelity."
These words are ultimately derived from fides, the Latin word for "faith."

Titanic

 WORD OF THE DAY

titanic / adjective / tye-TAN-ik

Definition
1: having great magnitude, force, or power
2: colossal

Examples
"A supernova occurs when a massive star in the bright disk of the galaxy runs out of fuel at the end of its life. With no 'fire' in its belly to beat back gravity's inexorable pull, the star implodes and then rebounds in a titanic explosion that rips it apart."
— Bob King, The Duluth (Minnesota) News Tribune, 30 Aug. 2020

"Even more impressive, is that in 1976-77 the band had yet to reach its commercial peak and was far from a proven arena-packing act. The tour lasted so long and was such a titanic undertaking, it was a key factor in the group taking an extended hiatus to recharge in the years following."
— Kelly Dearmore, The Dallas Observer, 11 Mar. 2020

Did You Know?
Before becoming the name of the most famous ship in history, titanic referred to the Titans, a family of giants in Greek mythology who were believed to have once ruled the earth.
They were subsequently overpowered and replaced by the younger Olympian gods under the leadership of Zeus.
The size and power of the Titans is memorialized in the adjective titanic and in the noun titanium, a chemical element of exceptional strength that is used in the production of steel.

Poignant

 WORD OF THE DAY

poignant / adjective / POY-nyunt

Definition
1a: painfully affecting the feelings
1b: piercing
1c: deeply affecting
1d: touching
1e: designed to make an impression
1f: cutting
2a: pleasurably stimulating
2b: being to the point
2c: apt
3: pungently pervasive

Examples
"Across Texas and the U.S. this year, high schools and universities scrambled to find ways to give students a meaningful graduation amid the coronavirus pandemic. There have been virtual events, drive-through ceremonies in parking lots and more traditional in-person events that took several days to ensure social distancing…. Images from those atypical ceremonies provide a poignant reminder of the ways life changed as the coronavirus spread."
— Jamie Stengle, The Associated Press, 27 Dec. 2020

"It's hard to pick apart a film that is as well-intentioned as Here Today, which earnestly wants to celebrate life, and every beautiful, tragic, poignant and surprising moment."
— Katie Walsh, The San Diego Union-Tribune, 6 May 2021

Did You Know?
Poignant comes to English from French, and before that from Latin—specifically, the Latin verb pungere, meaning "to prick or sting."
Several other common English words derive from pungere, including pungent, which can refer to, among other things, a sharp odor.
The influence of pungere can also be seen in puncture, as well as punctual, which originally meant simply "of or relating to a point."
Even compunction and expunge come from this pointedly relevant Latin word.

Bumptious

WORD OF THE DAY

bumptious / adjective / BUMP-shus

Definition
1: presumptuously, obtusely, and often noisily self-assertive
2: obtrusive

Examples
"The brash, bumptious New Yorkers I'd encountered in college had assured me that everything in New York was 'the best.'"
— Herbert Buchsbaum, The New York Times, 19 Jan. 2021

"Since its introduction in the late 1990s, the Escalade has been the 118-year-old Detroit luxury brand’s flagship—its most expensive model, and the one that perhaps best represents the marque's distinctly American blend of bumptious brazenness, brassy luxury, and go-anywhere capability."
— Brett Berk, Architectural Digest, 10 Feb. 2020

Did You Know?
While we've uncovered evidence dating bumptious to the beginning of the 19th century, the word was uncommon enough decades later that Edward Bulwer-Lytton included the following in his 1850 My Novel:
"'She holds her head higher, I think,' said the landlord, smiling. 'She was always—not exactly proud like, but what I calls Bumptious.' 'I never heard that word before,' said the parson, laying down his knife and fork. 'Bumptious indeed, though I believe it is not in the dictionary, has crept into familiar parlance, especially amongst young folks at school and college.'"
The word is, of course, now in "the dictionary"; Merriam-Websters' notes that it comes from the noun bump and the -tious of fractious.

Enjoin

 WORD OF THE DAY

enjoin / verb / in-JOIN

Definition
1: to direct or impose by authoritative order or with urgent admonition
2a: forbid, prohibit
2b: to prohibit by a judicial order
2c: put an injunction on

Examples
"And yet, to satisfy this good old man, / I would bend under any heavy weight/ That he'll enjoin me to." — William Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing, 1598-99

"The city attorney has explicitly written of this exclusion in a letter to the residents of my neighborhood, enjoining us from communicating at all with our city councilors, on the matter of the Zia Station development."
— Antoinette Shook, The Santa Fe New Mexican, 1 May 2021

Did You Know?
Enjoin has the Latin verb jungere, meaning "to join," at its root, but the kind of joining expressed by enjoin is quite particular: it is about linking someone to an action or activity by either requiring or prohibiting it.
When it's the former at hand—that is, when enjoin is used to mean "to direct or impose by authoritative order or with urgent admonition"—the preposition to is typically employed, as in "they enjoined us to secrecy."
When prohibition is involved, from is common, as in "signs enjoin attendees from photographing the event."
In legal contexts, enjoining involves prohibition by judicial order, through means of an injunction, as in "the judge enjoined them from selling the contract."

Didactic

 WORD OF THE DAY

didactic / adjective / dye-DAK-tik

Definition
1a: designed or intended to teach
1b: intended to convey instruction and information as well as pleasure and entertainment
2: making moral observations

Examples
Many of the shows on the channel are didactic, teaching children about such things as the importance of recycling, exercise, and honesty through the actions of animated characters.

"[Beverly] Cleary frowned on the moralizing, didactic themes that dominated children's literature in the first half of the 20th century. She set out not to impart wisdom but instead to portray children at play, and to capture their dialogue and the ways they sometimes venture into an adult world beyond their full comprehension."
— Harrison Smith and Becky Krystal, The Tampa Bay (Florida) Times, 27 Mar. 2021

Did You Know?
Didaktikós is a Greek word that means "apt at teaching."
It comes from didáskein, meaning "to teach." Something didactic does just that: it teaches or instructs.
Didactic conveyed that neutral meaning when it was first borrowed in the 17th century, and still does; a didactic piece of writing is one that is meant to be instructive as well as artistic.
Parables are generally didactic because they aim to teach a moral lesson.
Didactic now sometimes has negative connotations, too, however.
Something described as "didactic" is often overburdened with instruction to the point of being dull.
Or it might be pompously instructive or moralistic.

Solipsism

 WORD OF THE DAY

solipsism / noun / SOH-lip-sih-zum

Definition
1: a theory holding that the self can know nothing but its own modifications and that the self is the only existent thing; also : extreme egocentrism

Examples
"The solipsism born of social distancing and months of relative confinement leads me to see everything in relation to my current problem, which is online kindergarten."
— Lydia Kiesling, The New Yorker, 5 Oct. 2020

"The 41 essays in Vesper Flights continue her explorations into the more-than-human world. Whether viewing feral pigs … or tracking deer along the edge of a motorway, Macdonald works hard to break us humans out of our species solipsism."
— Jason Mark, Sierra, 8 Nov. 2020

Did You Know?
French philosopher René Descartes (1596-1650) can be blamed for the idea that if one whittles away beliefs about which one cannot be certain, one will eventually land at the existence of the self as a singular certainty; however, he cannot be blamed for either the word solipsism or the theory it refers to.
(Descartes avoided falling into solipsism by positing that ideas known with the same clarity as the existence of the self is known must also be true.)
Philosophical application of the word likely owes something to the French translation of a satiric work written by Venetian scholar Giulio Clemente Scotti in 1645 called Monarchia Solipsorum —in French, La Monarchie des Solipses.
The pertinent term is a composite of the Latin solus ("alone") and ipse ("self").

Rigmarole

 WORD OF THE DAY

rigmarole / noun / RIG-uh-muh-rol

Definition
1: confused or meaningless talk
2: a complex and sometimes ritualistic procedure

Examples
"We know now, thanks to Reddit threads and social media doing its due diligence, the real reason McDonald's ice cream machines always seem to be broken is because they're not—they just take four hours and an 11-step process to clean. This rigmarole is often what's actually preventing McDonald's employees from serving up your hot fudge sundae."
— Megan Scott, Mashed.com, 23 Oct. 2020

"You've gone through the appointment rigmarole to get signed up for a COVID vaccine, got your first shot, waited the required three to four week period for your second. But when that booster dose comes, be warned that you might be experiencing symptoms a few hours later."
— Gershon Harrell, The Columbus (Ohio) Dispatch, 26 Feb. 2021

Did You Know?
In the Middle Ages, the term Rageman or Ragman referred to a game in which a player randomly selected a string attached to a roll of verses and read the selected verse.
The roll was called a Ragman roll after a fictional king purported to be the author of the verses.
By the 16th century, ragman and ragman roll were being used figuratively to mean "a list or catalog."
Both terms fell out of written use, but ragman roll persisted in speech, and in the 18th century it resurfaced in writing as rigmarole, with the meaning "a succession of confused, meaningless, or foolish statements."
In the mid-19th century rigmarole (also spelled rigamarole, reflecting its common pronunciation) acquired the sense referring to a complex and ritualistic procedure.

Peach

 WORD OF THE DAY

peach / verb / PEECH

Definition
1a:  to inform against
1b: betray
2a:  to turn informer
2b: blab

Examples
"They'll think his lordship, or perhaps his brother, peached on them."
— Grace Burrowes, Gabriel: Lord of Regrets, 2013

"Peter cocked his head. 'What are the chances of him finding out who peached him?' 'He will certainly never hear it from me.' She slid her gaze to her coachman. 'Or Gary. As long as you don't say anything, there is no chance.'"
— Michelle Diener, The Emperor's Conspiracy, 2012

Did You Know?
If you guessed that the origin of this verb peach has something to do with a slightly fuzzy fruit, you are unfortunately incorrect.
The fruit peach is an unrelated word that traces back to the Latin phrase malum persicum, literally meaning "Persian fruit."
The verb blossomed from Middle English apechen ("to accuse"), itself an offspring of the Anglo-French verbs apecher and empecher, both meaning "to ensnare."
Empecher is also an ancestor of the English verb impeach, meaning "to bring an accusation against."
 Both of these English verbs can be traced back to Latin impedicare, meaning "to shackle the feet," and that word is itself rooted in ped-, pes, meaning "foot."

Colleague

WORD OF THE DAY

colleague / noun / KAH-leeg

Definition
: an associate or coworker typically in a profession or in a civil or ecclesiastical office and often of similar rank or status : a fellow worker or professional

Examples
Rochelle's creativity, professional demeanor, and ability to get things done soon earned her the respect of her colleagues.

"Without an option to drop by a colleague's desk to ask a casual question, teams felt there should be more process conversations, but also that these chats could be exhausting. Some teams moved away from using video meetings to less-demanding communication tools like Slack."
— The New York Times, 24 Apr. 2021

Did You Know?
Which of the following words come from the same source as colleague: college, legacy, collaborate, allegation, collar, relegate, delegate?
It might be easier to guess if you know that the ancestor in question is legare, a Latin verb meaning "to choose or send as a deputy or emissary" or "to bequeath."
All of the words in the list above except collaborate (which comes from the Latin collaborare, meaning "to labor together") and collar (from collum, collus, Latin for "neck") are descendants of legare.

Anfractuous

 WORD OF THE DAY

anfractuous / adjective / an-FRAK-chuh-wus

Definition
1: full of windings and intricate turnings
2: tortuous

Examples
"Then, as the road resumed its anfractuous course, clinging to the extreme margin of this tumbled and chaotic coast, the fun began. It was impossible to count the roller-coaster climbs and downward swoops; ravines skirted; rivers ingeniously bridged; bends tight as the loops in a thumbprint; naked rockfaces; cliff-edge encounters, hundreds of feet above the ocean, each of which induced a sickly pang of vertigo."
— Jonathan Raban, The New York Times, 10 June 2011

"Readers who require a single conflict or steady linear progression may find Lurkers' anfractuous structure unwieldy, but there's something cinematic about how Lurkers works. The novel recalls the winding yet interconnected narratives of Robert Altman films like Nashville (1975) and Short Cuts (1993)."
— John A. Riley, PopMatters, 1 Mar. 2021

Did You Know?
Plots and paths can be anfractuous. They twist and turn but do not break. Never mind that the English word comes ultimately from the Latin verb frangere, meaning "to break."
(Frangere is also the source of fracture, fraction, fragment, and frail.) But one of the steps between frangere and anfractuous is Latin anfractus, meaning "coil, bend."
The prefix an- here means "around." At first, anfractuous was all about ears and the auditory canal's anfractuosity, that is, its being curved rather than straight.
Anfractuous has been around for centuries, without a break, giving it plenty of time to wind its way into other applications; e.g., there can be an anfractuous thought process or an anfractuous shoreline.