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word | 1 Jul 2003 15:55

antebellum

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The Word of the Day for June 30 is:

antebellum   \an-tih-BEH-lum\   adjective
     : existing before a war; especially : existing before the 
Civil War

Example sentence:
     _Gone With the Wind_, published June 30, 1936, follows 
Scarlett O'Hara from her life of privilege in the antebellum 
South, through the hardships of the Civil War, and into the post-
war reconstruction period.

Did you know?
     "Antebellum" means "before the war," but it wasn't widely 
associated with the U.S. Civil War (1861-1865) until after that 
conflict was over. It comes from the Latin phrase "ante bellum" 
(literally, "before the war"). Although it did appear in at 
least one publication around 1847, that reference clearly wasn't 
to the War Between the States. The term's earliest known 
association with the Civil War is found in an 1862 diary 
entry: "Her face was placid and unmoved, as in antebellum days." 
The author of that line, Mary Boykin Miller Chesnut, recorded 
the observation of life during the Civil War while accompanying 
her husband, an officer in the Confederate army, on one of his
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word | 1 Jul 2003 15:56

Antaean

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The Word of the Day for July 1 is:

Antaean   \an-TEE-un\   adjective
     1 : mammoth
    *2 : having superhuman strength

Example sentence:
      In an emergency, an average person can become an Antaean 
powerhouse, capable even of lifting a car to rescue someone 
trapped underneath.

Did you know?
     In Greek mythology, Antaeus was the gigantic and powerful 
son of Gaea the Earth goddess and Poseidon the sea god. Antaeus 
was a wrestler and whenever he touched his mother (the Earth), 
his strength was renewed, so he always won his battles even if 
his opponents threw him to the ground.  He proved invincible 
until he challenged Hercules to wrestle. Hercules discovered the 
source of the giant's strength, lifted him off the ground, and 
crushed him to death. In 18th century England, the poet William 
Mason discovered the power of "Antaean" as a descriptive English 
adjective, when he used it in his _Ode to the Hon. William 
Pitt_: "If foil'd at first, resume thy course/ Rise strengthen'd 
with Antaean force."
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word | 2 Jul 2003 06:00

shanghai

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The Word of the Day for July 2 is:

shanghai   \SHANG-hye\   verb
     : to force aboard a ship for service as a sailor; also : to 
trick or force into an undesirable position 

Example sentence: 
     "I'm being shanghaied!" cried Uncle Jim at the family 
picnic when Aunt Marie pulled him away from the volleyball game 
to start the barbecue. 

Did you know? 
     In the 1800s, long sea voyages were very difficult and 
dangerous, so people were understandably hesitant to become 
sailors. But sea captains and shipping companies needed crews to 
sail their ships, so they gathered sailors any way they could -- 
even if that meant resorting to kidnapping by physical force or 
with the help of liquor or drugs. The word "shanghai" comes from 
the name of the Chinese city of Shanghai. People started to use 
the city's name for that unscrupulous way of obtaining sailors 
because the East was often a destination of ships that had 
kidnapped men onboard as crew.

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word | 3 Jul 2003 06:00

viand

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The Word of the Day for July 3 is:

viand   \VYE-und\   noun
     1 : an item of food; especially : a choice or tasty dish 
    *2 plural : provisions, food

Example sentence: 
     Adam couldn't help smiling as he read the opening line of 
the invitation to the Smith's annual wine-tasting and dinner 
party: "Join Us for Vino and Viands."

Did you know?
     Are you someone who eats to live, or someone who lives to 
eat? Either way, you'll find that the etymology of "viand" 
reflects the close link between food and life. "Viand" entered 
English in the 15th century from Anglo-French ("viande" 
means "meat" even in modern French), and it derives ultimately 
from the Latin "vivere," meaning "to live."  "Vivere" is the 
ancestor of a number of other lively and life-giving words in 
English, including "victual," "revive," "survive," "convivial," 
and "vivacious."

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.
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word | 4 Jul 2003 06:00

canicular

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The Word of the Day for July 4 is:

canicular   \kuh-NIK-yuh-lur\   adjective
         : of or relating to the dog days of summer

Example sentence:
       My canicular cravings are few, but they are irresistible: 
a cold drink, a soft hammock, and a good read.

Did you know?
     The Latin word "canicula," meaning "small dog," is the 
diminutive form of "canis," the word that ultimately gives us 
the English word "canine." "Canicula" was also the name for 
Sirius, the star that represents the hound of the hunter Orion 
in the constellation named for that Roman mythological figure. 
Because the first visible rising of Sirius occurs during the 
summer, the hot sultry days that occur from early July to early 
September came to be called "dies caniculares," or as we know 
them in English, "the dog days."

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word | 5 Jul 2003 06:30

fugacious

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The Word of the Day for July 5 is:

fugacious   \fyoo-GAY-shuss\   adjective
     : lasting a short time : evanescent

Example sentence:
     Julie's bad mood was fugacious; she cheered up considerably 
when her son phoned to say he would be coming home for a visit.

Did you know?
     "Fugacious" is often used to describe immaterial things 
like emotions, but not always. Botanists also use it to describe 
plant parts that wither or fall off before the usual time. 
Things that are fugacious are "fleeting," and etymologically 
they can also be said to be "fleeing." "Fugacious" derives from 
the Latin verb "fugere," which means "to flee." Other 
descendants of "fugere" include "fugitive," "refuge," 
and "subterfuge." 

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word | 6 Jul 2003 06:00

tantivy

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The Word of the Day for July 6 is:

tantivy   \tan-TIH-vee\   adverb
     : in a headlong dash : at a gallop 

Example sentence:
         The picnic feast was all laid out when suddenly the 
skies opened up -- what a scramble as everyone grabbed something 
and headed tantivy for the shelter of the porch!

Did you know?
     "Tantivy" is also a noun meaning "a rapid gallop" or "an 
impetuous rush." Although its precise origin isn't known, one 
theory has it that "tantivy" represents the sound of a galloping 
horse's hooves. The noun does double duty as a word meaning "the 
blare of a trumpet or horn." This is probably due to confusion 
with "tantara," a word for the sound of a trumpet that came 
about as an imitation of that sound. Both "tantivy" 
and "tantara" were used during foxhunts; in the heat of the 
chase people may have jumbled the two.

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word | 7 Jul 2003 06:30

cognoscente

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The Word of the Day for July 7 is:

cognoscente   \kahn-yuh-SHEN-tee\   noun, plural cognoscenti
     : a person who has expert knowledge in a subject : 
connoisseur

Example sentence:
     "The great but not widely known pianist Dave McKenna ... is 
revered by the jazz cognoscenti as an inspired interpreter of 
American standards...." (Joseph Nocera, _GQ_, March 1997)

Did you know?
     "Cognoscente" and "connoisseur" are more than synonyms; 
they're also linguistic cousins. Both terms descend from the 
Latin verb "cognoscere," meaning "to know," and they're not 
alone. You may know that "cognizance" and "cognition" are 
members of the "cognoscere" clan. Do you also recognize a family 
resemblance in "recognize"? Can you see through the disguise 
of "incognito"? Did you have a premonition that we would 
mention "precognition"? "Cognoscente" itself came to English by 
way of Italian and has been a part of our language since the 
late 1700s. Today it is almost always used in its plural 
form, "cognoscenti."
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word | 8 Jul 2003 06:00

rotisserie

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The Word of the Day for July 8 is: 

rotisserie   \roh-TIH-suh-ree\   adjective
     : of, relating to, or being a sports league consisting of 
imaginary teams whose performance is based on the statistics of 
actual players

Example sentence:
     Miguel watched the game intently, rooting not only for the 
home club but also the players on his rotisserie team. 

Did you know?
     Fantasy sports such as rotisserie baseball have become 
popular even among lukewarm sports fans. First invented in 1979 
by publishing consultant Daniel Okrent, rotisserie baseball 
allows fans a way to follow their pastime interactively by 
compiling teams of real-life players and rating the success of 
their team based on those players. We can attribute this new 
sense of the word "rotisserie" to La Rotisserie Francaise, the 
now-defunct Manhattan restaurant where Okrent and his fellow 
rotisserie buffs first gathered to perfect the rules of the game 
and to compare statistics. Variations of the game have since 
spread to a number of other major sports (including football and 
basketball), and the word "rotisserie" is applied to these games
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word | 9 Jul 2003 16:22

peloton

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The Word of the Day for July 9 is:

peloton   \peh-luh-TAHN\   noun
     : the main body of riders in a bicycle race

Example sentence:
     Thousands of cycling fans lined the race route, relaxing in 
lawn chairs as they waited for the peloton to speed by. 

Did you know? 
     If you've ever watched the Tour de France on television, 
you've seen plenty of the peloton, the seemingly endless flow of 
brightly colored riders making up the central group. You may 
have also gained some inadvertent insight into the word itself, 
which as you may have guessed is French in origin. In 
French, "peloton" literally means "ball," but it is most often 
used with the meaning "group." It's frequently used in the 
bicycling context, just as in English, but it can also refer to 
a group in a marathon or other sporting event. French "peloton" 
can also mean "squad" or "platoon," and since we've told you 
that you probably won't be too surprised to learn that it is 
also the source of our word "platoon."

NOTE: Today's Word of the Day can be found in the NEW Eleventh
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