"That's a great deal to make one word mean," Alice said in a thoughtful tone. "When I make a word do a lot of work like that," said Humpty Dumpty, "I always pay it extra."
Saturday, 1 January 2011
Jumentous
Jumentous means smelling strongly of a beast of burden; smelling like horse urine.
This is one word the meaning of which I would have never guessed. I'd have put it into a totally different context, such as "He was jumentously busy during the weeks leading up to Christmas".
My daughter Helen commented in November 2008 in her Blog that she was now keeping a notebook of new words that she came across during her reading. "This week I bought a lovely little leather bound book to write new words in as I read them . I've added a few from "1984", but my favourite has to be persiflage (from the French persifler) which means banter." I later discovered that my older daughter, Bryony, also kept a similar notebook.
This inspired me to create a Word blog. This will include both new words, favourite words and the origins of phrases that we commonly use. A definition and some comment, perhaps even a relevant quotation, will acompany the word or phrase.
“I am a Bear of Very Little Brain, and long words bother me.” - Winnie the Pooh
This is one word the meaning of which I would have never guessed. I'd have put it into a totally different context, such as "He was jumentously busy during the weeks leading up to Christmas".
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