Word of the Day

The spelling lachrymose, “suggestive of or causing tears,” is enough to make a person downright weepy. Lachrymose is a learned misspelling of Latin lacrimōsus “weeping, tearful, in tears,” a derivative of the noun lacrima “a tear, weeping, lament.” In preclassical Latin the form was dacrima, which is the original form, lacrima the innovation (as with original Odysseus, the innovative Ulixes, and the hybrid Ulysses). Old Latin dacrima is related to the Greek noun dákryon, the “everyday” word for tears, but it looks quite close to the rare, poetic Greek noun dákrȳma (with a long upsilon) “something to be wept over, a matter for tears” (uttered by the oracle of Delphi). The association of lacrima, dacrima, and dákrȳma was enough to allow medieval scribes to innovate the pseudo-Greek spelling lachrymōsus. Lachrymose entered English in the second half of the 17th century.

The Dutch compound word uitwaaien means “to jog or walk into the wind, especially in the winter, in order to feel invigorated, relieve stress, and boost one’s health” (others prefer sitting in cozy coffeehouses or quiet neighborhood bars). Uitwaaien is composed of the preposition and prefix uit “out” (its pronunciation is not much different from English out) and the verb waaien “to blow.” Waaien comes from the same Proto-Indo-European root as Sanskrit vā́ti “(it is) blowing,” Latin ventum “wind,” Germanic (English) “weather, wind,” and Slavic (Polish) wieje “(it is) blowing.” Uitwaaien entered English in the first decade of the 21st century.

The modern spelling harbinger “an omen, sign, or herald,” has an internal -n- from the Middle English variant spellings herbengar, herbenger, which arose in the second half of the 15th century. This -n- also appears, for example, in messenger (from message) and passenger (from passage). The many Middle English spellings include herbeg(e)our, herberger, herbergio(u)er. The noun originally referred to an officer of a king or nobleman who assigned lodgings to guests or rode ahead to arrange lodgings, or to a military officer who laid out encampments, or to a soldier who was part of the vanguard. Harbinger later came to mean simply “host, hospitable person.” The Middle English forms come from Old French herbergeor, herberg(i)ere “one who offers lodging, host, innkeeper,” from Frankish heriberga “lodging, inn” (in Old Saxon and Old High German “shelter for an army”). The Old English equivalent, herebeorg “quarters, shelter, lodgings,” survives in English as harbor. Harbinger entered English in the second half of the 12th century.

Diegetic, “happening within or being the created world of a story,” is a technical term used in literary criticism, both in ancient Greek and in modern English. Its Greek original is diēgētikόs, a variant of diēgēmatikόs “pertaining to a narrative;” Aristotle uses both variants in the Poetics with the noun poíēsis “poetry” (i.e., “narrative poetry”). Both adjectives are derivatives of the noun diḗgēsis “narration, narrative” and derive from the verb diēgeîsthai “to set out in detail, describe.” Diegetic entered English in the second half of the 20th century.

A holophrase is “a word functioning as a phrase or sentence”; it comes from the Greek adjective hόlos (combining form holo-) “whole, entire,” and the noun phrásis “speech, way of speaking, expression.” Holophrases are the usual form of speech when children are learning to talk, as when your toddler stands in front of you with raised arms, and says “Up,” meaning “Pick me up.” Holophrase entered English at the end of the 19th century.