travail

Mar. 5th, 2007 07:33 am
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Theme week of Arthuriana -- words I met while reading Idylls of the King. Starting off with:


travail - n., painful or arduous work, severe toil or exertion; agony, anguish. v., to work very hard, toil; to suffer the pangs of childbirth.


Knights errant always endure great travail -- as do, sometimes, the reader. From Middle English, from Anglo-French, from travailler, to torment, labor, journey, from Vulgar Latin trepaliare, to torture, from Late Latin trepalium, instrument of torture, from Latin tripalis, having three stakes, from tri- + palus, stake. The exact nature of the trepalium is unknown.

---L.

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