Word of the Day

Fantabulous, a slang term meaning “excellent, wonderful,” is a blend of fantastic and fabulous. The word first appeared in the US in 1953, in New Zealand in 1959, and in the UK by 1961.

Alembic “a vessel with a beaked cap or head, formerly used in distilling,” covers quite a bit of Western civilization. It comes from Middle English alambik, alembec, lambic, lembic, from Middle French alembic, alambic and from Medieval Latin alembicus, alembicum. The English, French, and Latin forms come from Arabic al-anbīq, composed of al- “the” and anbīq “a vessel for distilling, a distilling flask, a still.” Anbīq comes via Persian from Greek ámbix (stem ámbīk-) “a vessel with a spout, an alembic.” Alembic entered English in the late 14th century.

Torrential “falling in rushing, violent, or abundant and unceasing streams” is a derivative of the noun torrent. Torrent comes from the Latin noun torrens (inflectional stem torrent-) “a rushing stream, torrent.” Torrens is also a present participle meaning “scorching, burning hot,” but also, curiously, “flowing headlong, rushing, torrential,” which Latinists confess is not easily explained. Torrens comes from the verb torrēre “to heat, scorch, dry up,” from the root ters-, source also of Latin terra “land, dry land.” Torrential entered English in the first half of the 19th century.

Shibboleth “a peculiarity of pronunciation distinguishing one group of people from another” comes from Biblical Hebrew shibbōleth, which occurs in Judges 12:4-6. The Gileadites used the word shibbōleth as a linguistic test to distinguish themselves from the fleeing Ephraimites, who pronounced shibbōleth as sibbōleth. Shibbōleth is translated in the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Hebrew scriptures, and in the Vulgate, the Latin translation of the Hebrew and Greek scriptures, as “ear of grain.” But modern scholars think that shibbōleth means “freshet, a sudden rise in the level of a stream or river, as by heavy rainfall,” because the slaughter of the Ephraimites by the Gileadites took place at the fords of the river Jordan. Shibboleth entered English in the second half of the 14th century in John Wycliffe’s translation of the Bible (Wycliffe used the spellings Sebolech and Shebolech).

The verb grouse originated as a piece of British army slang, and several of its earliest occurrences are in Rudyard Kipling’s Barrack-Room Ballads (1892). Slang terms like grouse are notoriously difficult to etymologize, and grouse is no exception. Scholars have noted, however, a connection between grouse and Old French groucier, groucher, grocier “to grumble, murmur,” source of English grouch, grudge, and grutch (British dialect for grudge). Grouse entered English in the second half of the 19th century.