palimpsest
Mar. 26th, 2013 07:32 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
prettygoodwordpalimpsest (PAL-imp-sest) - n., a manuscript of parchment etc. which has had the writing scraped off and been reused; an object or place with older layers or aspects apparent beneath the surface.
The scraping does not completely erase the previous text, and it can often still be read -- and it's this aspect that's used in the metaphoric extension. Common contexts for that sense includes architecture (as when a building gets a makeover), geology (esp. lunar geology with craters mostly erased by later impacts), and both computer and neurological memories. Borrowed in 1661 from Latin palimpsēstus, from Greek palímpsestos, scraped again, from palin, again (as palindrome) + psēn, to scrape/rub smooth, in an adjectival form.
---L.
The scraping does not completely erase the previous text, and it can often still be read -- and it's this aspect that's used in the metaphoric extension. Common contexts for that sense includes architecture (as when a building gets a makeover), geology (esp. lunar geology with craters mostly erased by later impacts), and both computer and neurological memories. Borrowed in 1661 from Latin palimpsēstus, from Greek palímpsestos, scraped again, from palin, again (as palindrome) + psēn, to scrape/rub smooth, in an adjectival form.
---L.
