Word of the Day

Dissent “disagreement with a party or government” comes by way of Middle English and Middle French from the Latin verb dissentīre, “to differ, disagree,” which is based on the prefix dis- “apart” and the verb sentīre “to feel, observe.” Dissent is both a verb and a noun, and the noun sense arose in the late 16th century, well over one hundred years after the verb first appeared in English. The Latin verb sentīre has two stems: sent- and sens-. The first of these is found in English sentence, sentient, sentiment, and sentinel, while the second appears in consensus, sense, sensible, and sensual—all of which relate in some way to feeling, thought, opinion, or observation. Sentīre is also the source of numerous Romance language words and phrases related to emotion and perception, including Spanish lo siento “I am sorry” (literally “I feel it”). Dissent was first recorded in English in the early 15th century.

Choice “the right to choose” is a noun derived from the Old French verb choisir “to perceive, choose,” which comes from a long-lost source in one of the Germanic languages, perhaps Frankish. Unlike choice, the verb choose is native to English and was recorded in Old English as cēosan, in which -an marked an infinitive verb, just as adding the separate word to before a verb does today. Ultimately, both choice and choose are related to Ancient Greek geúesthai “to taste” and Latin gustus “tasting, flavor, sense of taste.” From the former, English has adopted ageusia “loss of the sense of taste” and dysgeusia “impairment of the sense of taste,” while the latter is the source of (through Italian) gusto “hearty or keen enjoyment” and (through French) ragout, a type of tasty meat stew. Choice was first recorded in English in the late 13th century.

Opprobrious “outrageously disgraceful or shameful” is an adaptation of Late Latin opprobriōsus, literally meaning “full of reproach,” based on opprobrium “reproach” and the adjectival suffix -ōsus “full of.” Opprobrium itself is a compound of the preposition ob “toward, against” and the noun probrum “infamy, disgrace,” with the b in ob assimilated to match the p in probrum. Confusion frequently arises about the similarity between probrum and the Latin adjective probus “good” (the source of approbation and approval), but the two are not quite related; probrum may literally mean “(thing) brought forward,” such as a complaint, while probus may have originally meant “being in front,” as in better than everything that follows. Opprobrious was first recorded in English in the late 14th century.

Prerogative “a right limited to a specific person” derives via Middle English from Latin praerogātīvus “voting first,” a compound of the preposition prae “before” and the verb rogāre “to ask, propose.” Prae is the source of the prefix pre-, which appears in three other words in this paragraph, while rogāre gives rise to several question- and claim-related words, such as arrogant (originally meaning “presuming”), interrogate, and surrogate (originally meaning “to nominate as a substitute”). Prerogative was first recorded in English in the late 1300s.

Fortuitous “happening or produced by chance” ultimately comes from the Latin noun fors (stem fort-) “chance, luck.” Though chance and luck are not quite one and the same, the overlap between the two is why fortuitous evolved a second, more common sense of “lucky, fortunate.” Also derived from fors is the noun fortūna, which is the source of English fortune. The Roman goddess Fortūna was the goddess of luck as well as fate, and the Romans celebrated a festival in her honor, Fors Fortūna, annually on June 24. Note that Latin fors is not related to the English words forte “a person’s strength” and fortify “to strengthen against attack,” which come instead from Latin fortis “strong, brave” (compare Spanish fuerte). Fortuitous was first recorded in English circa 1650.