Bailiwick

WORD OF THE DAY

 

BAILIWICK \ BAY-lih-wik \ noun

 

Definition

1: the office or jurisdiction of a bailiff

 

2: a special domain

 

Examples

Since the organization of the annual Halloween party is Rhonda's bailiwick, you'll have to let her know if you plan to bring something to the festivities this year.

"The conventional wisdom is that young people no longer care enough to stand up for what is important; that the days of activism and protest have faded into the past, the bailiwick of aging hippies and activists."
— The Easton (Massachusetts) Journal, 22 May 2015

 

Did You Know?

The first half of the word bailiwick comes from the Middle English word for "bailiff," in this case a term referring to a sheriff or chief officer of a town in medieval England, not the officer who assists today in U.S. courtrooms. Bailiff derives via Anglo-French from the Latin bajulare, meaning "to carry a burden." The second half of bailiwick comes from wik, a Middle English word for "dwelling place" or "village," which ultimately derived from the Latin vicus, meaning "village." (This root also gave us -wich and -wick, suffixes used in place names like Norwich and Warwick.) Although bailiwick dates from the 15th century, the "special domain" sense did not begin to appear in English until the middle of the 19th century.

Consternation

WORD OF THE DAY

 

CONSTERNATION \ kahn-ster-NAY-shun \ noun

 

Definition

: amazement or dismay that hinders or throws into confusion

 

Examples

To the consternation of her students, Mrs. Jennings gave a pop quiz on the first Friday of the school year.

"A [Russian] law that obliged bloggers to register with the government caused consternation last year…."
— Sam Schechner and Olga Razumovskaya, The Wall Street Journal, 31 Aug. 2015

 

Did You Know?

Wonder what the seemingly dissimilar words prostrate ("stretched out with face on the ground"), stratum ("layer"), and stratus ("a low cloud form extending over a large area") have in common with consternation? They are all thought to share the Latin ancestor sternere, meaning "to spread" or "to strike or throw down." Much to our consternation, we cannot make that sentence definitive: while prostrate, stratum, and stratus are clearly the offspring of sternere, etymologists will only go so far as to say that consternation comes from Latin consternare—and that they have a strong suspicion that consternare is another descendent of sternere.

Extradite

WORD OF THE DAY

 

EXTRADITE \ EK-struh-dyte \ verb

 

Definition

: to send (one who has been accused of a crime) to another state or country for trial

 

Examples

An alleged criminal is typically only extradited under the provisions of a treaty or statute, but a fugitive is occasionally surrendered by one state or country to another as an act of good will.

"A spokesperson [for the U.S. State Department] said that since Zimbabwe and the United States signed an extradition treaty in 2000, neither nation has extradited anyone to the other."
— Jennifer Bjorhus and Paul Walsh, The Star-Tribune (Minneapolis, Minnesota), 3 Aug. 2015

 

Did You Know?

Some countries have a tradition of extradition—a fact which might concern criminals. Likely of significantly less concern to most criminals is the fact that extradition and tradition are related; both come from the Latin verb tradere, which means "to hand over." (Think of a tradition as something handed over from one generation to the next.) Some other words that have been handed down from tradere include betray, traitor, and treason.