Word of the Day

The English adjective picaresque, “pertaining to or resembling rogues,” is modeled on Spanish picaresco “pertaining to or resembling a pícaro” (i.e., a rogue or vagabond), which first appears in print in Spanish in 1569. Picaresque in the sense “pertaining to a kind of narrative fiction” first appears in print in English in 1810; Spanish picaresco in the same sense appears in 1836. The etymology of pícaro is contested: it may come from the verb picar “to prick, pierce,” from Vulgar Latin piccāre, and be related to Latin pīcus “woodpecker.” Pícaro first appears in print in Spanish in the first half of the 16th century in the phrase pícaro de cozina “kitchen knave”; it was not a literary term. Pícaro in the sense “hero of a genre of novel” first appears in English in the first half of the 17th century.

Ravelment, “entanglement; confusion,” is a compound of the verb ravel “to tangle, entangle” and the noun suffix -ment, here denoting a resulting state. Ravel most likely comes from Dutch ravelen “to become entangled or confused, (of fabric or thread) to fray.” Ravelment entered English in the first half of the 19th century.

Predilection, “a tendency to think favorably of something; partiality; preference,” has several origins. One is Middle French prédilection, from the second half of the 15th century; another is Italian predilezione from the early 17th century ; and the final source is the rare Medieval Latin noun praedīlectiō (inflectional stem praedīlectiōn-), dating from the 10th century. Praedīlectiō is a derivative of the verb praedīligere, “to prefer over others,” a compound of the preposition and prefix prae, prae- “before” and dīligere “to love” (usually not as strong as amāre). Dīligere in turn is a compound of the prefix dis- “apart” and the simple verb legere “to choose, select.” Predilection entered English in the first half of the 17th century.

Schwa, the neutral vowel sound like the a in sofa, comes via German Schwa from Hebrew shəwā, a variant of shāw’, literally “nothingness, emptiness, vanity.” Jewish grammarians used the word to mean “a diacritic mark that shows a neutral vowel quality or no vowel at all.” Schwa entered English toward the end of the 19th century.

There has always been more than a hint of snobbery about banausic, “serving utilitarian purposes only; mechanical; practical.” The word comes from the Greek adjective banausikós, “pertaining to or for artisans,” which is related to the noun bausanía “handicraft; the habits of a mere artisan, bad taste, vulgarity.” Banausikós and bausanía are derivatives of baûnos (also baunós), “furnace, forge,” a pre-Greek word with no known etymology. In modern German Banause “uncouth person” is the exact equivalent of English Philistine. Banausic entered English in the first half of the 19th century.