Word of the Day
Phlegethon
noun
a stream of fire or fiery light.
More about Phlegethon
In addition to referring to “a stream of fire or fiery light,” Phlegethon retains its original meaning as the river of fire that surrounded Hades, the underworld, in Greek mythology. Its name literally means “burning” or “flaming” in Ancient Greek. The Phlegethon was one of five rivers in Hades; the others were the Acheron, Cocytus, Lethe, and Styx. While the Phlegethon was known as the river of fire, the Acheron was the river of sadness, the Cocytus was the river of weeping, the Lethe was the river of forgetfulness, and the Styx was the river of hatred. All five rivers coalesced at the center of Hades, and Charon ferried the souls of the dead either along the Acheron or the Styx, depending on the author.
how is Phlegethon used?
The buckets dropped; the water sizzed and steamed on the sand. The boy barely missed stumbling into a Phlegethon of molten iron as he dodged the murderous missile.
vamoose
verb (used without object)
to leave hurriedly or quickly; decamp.
More about vamoose
Vamoose is an adaptation of the Spanish phrase vamos, and unlike the majority of recent borrowings from Spanish, which preserve the original spelling and approximate the original pronunciation, vamoose is one of a small family of terms borrowed over 100 years ago that changed so much in both letters and sound that their connection to Spanish is almost unrecognizable. Alligator is one of these words; it comes from a Spanish phrase that means “the lizard.” So are buckaroo, an alteration of the Spanish word for “cowboy,” and cockroach, from Spanish cucaracha. The closest relative of vamoose is savvy, which derives from Spanish sabe (usted), meaning “(you, formal) know,” and is still sometimes used as a verb in English.
how is vamoose used?
Sitting beside Russo in the passenger seat of his wheezing Ford Galaxy, all throughout that long cross-country drive, was his mother. She’d decided it was time to vamoose, too, and who better to escape with than the son whom she always called her “rock.”
“The Brazilians prefer to make xixi in the streets,” he said. “We don’t have enough bathrooms for everyone.” Nearby, a woman was making her own bathroom right next to the entrance of a residential building, vamoosing only when the doorman, Clever Santos Chavez, chased her away.
minatory
adjective
menacing; threatening.
More about minatory
Despite the similar sound, minatory isn’t related to the name of the Minotaur, a human-bull hybrid in Greek mythology. Though the Minotaur was certainly a minatory creature, Minotaur is a compound of Minos, a king of Crete, and the Ancient Greek word for “bull,” while minatory ultimately derives from a Latin verb meaning “to threaten” and that was used in terms related to driving cattle with threats. This same Latin verb is the ultimate source of menace “a threat” and promenade “a stroll or walk,” both derived ultimately from the “cattle driving” sense.
how is minatory used?
When I woke up in the sleeping balcony and looked out the small casement window beside the bed at the bare branches nodding outside in the grey morning, tapping on the walls in an indecipherable but all too obviously minatory code, … I found it impossible to imagine how, in a month or so, they’d be green again, covered in the lushness of leaves and lifted by warmer breezes.
Since her father’s imprisonment, Minou handles the business, and she is in the shop when a mysterious envelope appears, addressed to her and bearing a terse, minatory message: “She knows that you live.”