prevaricate
Mar. 25th, 2021 07:32 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
prettygoodwordprevaricate (pri-VAR-i-kayt) - v., to speak or write evasively or misleadingly, equivocate; (UK) to behave in an indecisive manner, procrastinate.
That second main sense is acceptable in British usage but is generally considered unacceptable in American usage. The original sense (dating to the mid-16th century) was to deviate or digress in a physical way, as from a path, but that is pretty much obsolete, replaced by this metaphoric extension. The original Latin root, praevāricārī, meant both to walk crookedly and, by extension, to play a false or double part, from prae-, alternate form of pre-, before + vāricāre, to straddle, from vārus, bent outwards/deviating.
---L.
That second main sense is acceptable in British usage but is generally considered unacceptable in American usage. The original sense (dating to the mid-16th century) was to deviate or digress in a physical way, as from a path, but that is pretty much obsolete, replaced by this metaphoric extension. The original Latin root, praevāricārī, meant both to walk crookedly and, by extension, to play a false or double part, from prae-, alternate form of pre-, before + vāricāre, to straddle, from vārus, bent outwards/deviating.
---L.
