Larry's Pretty Good Word of the Day

holocaust (HOL-uh-kawst, HOH-luh-kawst) - n., a sacrifice that is completely burned to ashes, burnt offering; complete destruction by fire, the thing so destroyed; (usually as the Holocaust) the mass slaughter of European civilians and especially Jews by the Nazis during World War II; any mass slaughter or reckless destruction of life esp. by human agency.


A lot to unpack here. :deep breath: The burnt offering sense dates to the 1300s, used to translate Hebrew ‘ōlâ, "that which goes up [in smoke]," in Biblical contexts, from Late Latin holocaustum, from Ancient Greek holókauston, neuter of holókaustos, wholly burnt, used of sacrifices burnt to ashes rather than shared with the celebrants, from holo-, whole/entire + kaustós, burnt. The first extended sense developed in the 1600s, and was broadened in the 1900s to encompass other types of catastrophes, a usage now deprecated. It was first applied to what the Nazis did in 1942, but the proper noun doesn't appear until the late 1950s and wasn't widespread until around 1970. Because of that specialized use, the application to other destruction has become mostly restricted to human agency. :exhales: Other words with holo- include hologram ("whole stroke/line [i.e. drawing]") and holistic ("pertaining to the whole").

---L.

omniscient (om-NISH-uhnt) - adj., having total or unlimited knowledge, awareness, or understanding.


Our next all prefix comes from Latin omnis, meaning all. Also a noun, one who is all-knowing. This word was originally coined in Medieval Latin as omnisciēns, from omni(s) + sciēns, knowing (from scīre, to know) -- English as usual took on the stem form omniscient-. The original context was theological. Other words with omni- include omnivore ("eating all [the things]") and omnibus ("for all").

---L.

barmy (BAHR-mee) - adj., containing or covered with barm, the foam that forms on malt liquors while fermenting; bubbling with activity or excitement; (chiefly UK) crazy, odd, strange, foolish.


The first senses are easy to deal with: it goes back to Old English beorma, both the head/forth on a beer and the yeast that ferments it, from a Germanic root, exact PIE source unclear. That last, though, is much debated -- most authorities hold that it's either a non-rhotic-speaker's respelling of balmy in its sense of crazy/odd/foolish or a respelling influenced by barmy in the frothy sense, but some that it's an alteration of St. Bartholomew, one ward of the Hospital of St. Mary of Bethlehem, which last word also gave us bedlam (and Green's Dictionary of Slang notes that there was an asylum in Barming, Kent). So, like, 🤷🏼

---L.

binnacle (BIN-uh-kuhl) - n., a case that supports and protects a ship's compass.


Also, by extension, the cluster of instruments and switches mounted in a circular casing on or near the steering column of a car, though honestly I've never heard that usage. The binnacle is traditionally a small stand placed by the helm so the steersman can consult it, and made of wood or a non-magnetic metal to avoid interfering with the magnetic needle. Often it included a lamp so bearings can be read at night, and later refinements included iron masses to adjust the needle to point closer to true north. Attested from around 1620, alteration of earlier earlier bittacle, from either French habitacle, obsolete Spanish bitácula (modern spelling bitácora), or Portuguese bitácula, all three from Late Latin habitāculum, little dwelling place.

---L.

demesne (dih-MAYN, dih-MEEN) - n., manorial land retained by the feudal lord and not rented out to tenants; (law) possession of land as one's own; land belonging to and adjoining a manor house, estate; a realm, a domain.


This is a synonym of many senses of of domain, and indeed is a doublet of it -- both are from Old French demeine/demaine/demeigne/domaine, main sense being power, domain was taken directly from that into Middle English, while demesne, originally spelled demayne, passed through Anglo-Norman first. As to why this word switched from using -y- to -s- to indicate the vowel before it is long, that's a tricky bit, but there seems to have been influence from mesne (pronounced MEEN) meaning intermediate in a feudal context. As for that Old French domaine, it's a noun use of an adjective descended from Latin dominicus, belonging to a lord or master, from dominus, master/proprietor/owner, from domus, home/house, from PIE *dṓm, house/home, from the root *dem-, to build.

---L.

pongee (pon-JEE, PON-jee) - n., a light slub-woven fabric, usually raw silk but sometimes cotton or rayon.


Slub-woven fabrics use yarns of varying thickness, made by varying the strength of the twist -- sometimes the thicker parts are large enough to be noticeable, producing slubs. The word's been used in English since around 1710 and, given it was known from being a Chinese export, it's clearly taken from some Chinese dialect -- and given the era, I'd expect it to be Cantonese-or-related because Western merchants traded in southern China, but most dictionaries instead claim it's from Mandarin 本机, běnjī, glossed as meaning "one's own loom." Even aside from the question of what Westerners were hearing any Mandarin (which was the Beijing dialect), 本机 isn't actually a word in Mandarin. I mean, it can be understood as one's own machine, but 机 in itself doesn't mean loom, but any kind of machine -- loom is 织布机, zhībùjī. One dictionary hedges their bet with a perhaps and puts an asterisk of unattestation in front of běnjī, but still. OED claims it's from Mandarin, either běnjī, home-loom, or běnzhī, home-woven (presumably 本织), and that last is the only one that remotely makes sense.

---L.

cwtch or cwtsh or cootch (KUCH, KOOCH) - n., a hiding place, such as a cupboard or a cubbyhole; a hug, a cuddle. v., (often followed by up) to hug, cuddle, embrace, or comfort.


Yes, w can indeed be a vowel, if the word was taken from Welsh -- and given that origin, you won't be surprised to hear that this is SE UK dialect. The extra fun part is that, this entered English (around 1890) from Welsh cwtsh, the Welsh word was taken from Middle English couche, now spelled couch.

---L.

salamander (SAL-uh-man-der, sal-uh-MAN-der) - n., any lizard-shaped amphibian of the order Caudata, having a soft, moist, scaleless skin, found chiefly in northern temperate regions; a legendary lizard-like creature that is resistant to and lives in fire; in Paracelsian occult philosophy, the elemental being of fire; an object, such as a poker, used in fire or capable of withstanding heat; any of various portable stoves, burners, or heaters, esp. ones that heat from above; a mass of unfused material, such as metallic iron or partially reduced ore, in the hearth of a blast furnace.


Unlike gnome, where the folkloric process took Paracelsus's elemental and ran with it, here he took an existing folkloric being and identified it with an elemental. The oldest traces of the legendary being are discussions (multiple) by Aristotle, but they are widespread, including mentions in the Talmud. Given this pedigree, it shouldn't be surprising that the ultimate origin of the name is Ancient Greek, in the form salamándra, origin uncertain -- Persian samandar is one possibility, though etymologists debate whether instead the Persian name came from the Ancient Greek.

We've run out of elements, but not yet of words that Paracelsus coined -- we've got one more tomorrow.

---L.

sylph (SILF) - n., in Paracelsian occult philosophy, the elemental being of air; a slender, graceful woman or girl; any of several dark-green-and-blue hummingbirds (genus Aglaiocercus), the male of which has a long forked tail.


If you are sensing a pattern here, yes, Paracelsus did indeed coin or repurpose words for the elementals of the other two elements. I'd put in a pic of a hummer, but that'd distract from the main theme here. Coined (in the same posthumous work as undine) in Medieval Latin in the plural form sylphēs, apparently (he didn't explain) as a blend of Latin sylvestris, of the woods, and nympha, nymph (from Ancient Greek nýmphē).

---L.

pluripotent (ploor-uh-POHT-nt) - adj., capable of developing in many or unlimited ways; (biol.) capable of developing into any type of cell or tissue except those that form a placenta or embryo; (med.) capable of having more than one effect.


Often used of stem cells. Coined in the 1910s from Latin prefix plūri-, combining form of plūs, more (from PIE root meaning many) + English potent, which contains the concepts of both potential and potency.

---L.