some words

fun words from calendar pages I found from the Merriam-Webster 365 New Words a Year Page-a-Day calendar.


septentrional

adj : northern

My septentrional cousins were impressed by the tall stately palm that grows in our suburban Florida front yard.

DID YOU KNOW?

What does “septentrional” have in common with the month of September and the Big Dipper? The Latin word septem meant “seven,” and September was the seventh month in the earliest Roman calendar. We picked up “septentrional” from septentriones, a Latin word used to refer to the seven principal stars of either of two prominent constellations of the northern sky: Ursa Major (Latin for Greater Bear) or Ursa Minor (Lesser Bear), also known as the Big Dipper and the Little Dipper, respectively. Septentriones in turn derives from septem plus triones, meaning “plowing oxen.”

festinate

adj : hasty

Given the rudeness of our host, no one was surprised by our festinate departure from his home.

DID YOU KNOW?

“Festinate” is one among many in the category of words whose first recorded use is in the works of Shakespeare (“Advise the Duke where you are going, to a most festinate preparation.” —King Lear). Perhaps the Bard knew about festinatus, the Latin predecessor of “festinate,” or was familiar with the Latin proverb festina lente, “to make haste slowly.” Shakespeare also gets credit for the adverb “festinately,” first seen in Love’s Labour’s Lost: “Bring him festinately hither.” But another writer beat him to the verb “festinate” (pronounced 'fes-te-'nāt), meaning “to hasten.”

drub

v 1: to beat severely 2: to berate critically *3: to defeat decisively 4: to drum, stamp

*After being drubbed by the worst team in the league, the hometown players slunk into the locker room with their heads hanging low.

DID YOU KNOW?

Sportswriters love to use “drub,” but the term wasn’t always a sporting word. When first used in English, “drub” referred to a method of punishment that involved beating the soles of a culprit’s feet with a stick or cudgel. The term was apparently brought to England in the 17th century by travelers who reported observing the punitive practice in Asia. Etymologists are uncertain of its ultimate origin, but some have speculated that “drub” may have evolved from the Arabic word daraba, meaning “to beat.”