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More New Words

Yes, let us once again take a trip through rosy fields of wordly trees.

  • Ambergrised – (uncertain)
  • Argence – silveryness?
  • Apothegm – pithy instructive saying, maxim
  • Benison – blessing, benediction
  • Catafalque – funeral canopy
  • Chancrous – having an ulcer
  • Chrism – consecrated ointment
  • Crepitation – crackling
  • Etiolated – blanched, withered
  • Formication – feeling of ants on skin
  • Fructified – made fruitful, productive
  • Gavotte – old French dance
  • Knurling – small projection, knob
  • Incarnadine – dyed red
  • Inchoate – partial, just begun
  • Innominate – unnamed
  • Lambent – flickering, radiant
  • Limned – rendered artistically
  • Malison – curse, (antonym of benison)
  • Mephic – (uncertain) 2
  • Nacre – mother-of-pearl
  • Nacreous – like mother-of-pearl
  • Obbligato – persistent subordinate motif
  • Palliation – mitigation, hiding
  • Paucity – scarcity, insufficiency
  • Preterite – in the past
  • Redolent – scented, sweetly odorous
  • Roynish – mangy, mean
  • Sabulous – gritty, sandy
  • Stertorously – snoring, noisily breathing
  • Susurrus – whisper, sound of murmuring
  • Telic – purposive
  • Theurgy – miracle, sorcery
  • Thetic – setting forth, like a thesis
  • Threnody – song of lamentation, dirge
  • Travertine – white calcium carbonate

Ambergrised: Ambergris is “A substance of the consistence of wax, found floating in the Indian Ocean and other parts of the tropics, and also as a morbid secretion in the intestines of the sperm whale, which is believed to be in all cases its true origin. In color it is white, ash-gray, yellow, or black, and often variegated like marble. The floating masses are sometimes from sixty to two hundred and twenty-five pounds in weight. It is wholly volatilized as a white vapor at 212 Fahrenheit, and is highly valued in perfumery.” Make of that what you will.

Mephic: Really not certain on this one. Closest thing I could find is “mephis”, but it is more likely to mean something close to “mephitic”, which means noxious, poisonous, foul-smelling, etc.


New words

I’ve been reading the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant lately (yes, I am a sucker for any books with ‘chronicles’ in the name”) and I’ve learned some new words as a result:

  • Abysm – like an abyss but deeper
  • Aliment – nourishment, food
  • Anile – like an old woman, imbecile
  • Attar – fragrant essence
  • Cerements – waxy wrappings for the dead
  • Chasuble – an ecclesiastical vestment
  • Coruscating – sparkling
  • Extirpate – root out, exterminate
  • Febrile – feverish
  • Gelid – cold as ice
  • Hebetude – dullness
  • Inanition – being empty, starvation
  • Incondign – unworthy
  • Intaglio – engraving
  • Irenic – pacific
  • Leonine – lionlike
  • Malefic – harmful in purpose
  • Moiling – toiling, turbulent
  • Oriflamme – rallying object or ideal
  • Orison – prayer
  • Patina – thin layer, incrustation
  • Pennon – flag, pennant
  • Penumbra – shadow between darkness and light
  • Periapt – amulet, charm
  • Puissant – powerful
  • Roborant – restorative, invigorating medicine
  • Rictus – expanse of a mouth
  • Surcease – stop, termination
  • Suppurate – secrete pus
  • Suzerainty – supremacy
  • Unanodyned – uneased, unsoothed (this word appears to be made up)
  • Vermeil – bright red
  • Viand – food, provisions (in the plural)