Educated Guesswork

1. hythe (also hithe) — [British] river landing spot, small port or harbor

Originally, Jackson’s Inn had been a rude hythe on the river, and there are some who still say it was smuggling which gave him the ready cash to build his first hostelry.

 

2. opopanax — gum resin made from various plants, some used for medicine and others for perfume

The pungent scent of Lili’s opopanax hung in the air like the memory of a much regretted evening.

 

3. windlestraw — [British] grass used for plaiting or making ropes

Duncan made Molly a sort of sun hat with some windlestraw growing by the stream, so as to keep the bright sun off of her fair complexion.

 

4. impropriate — to transfer Church property to a layperson; to take or claim for private use

Of course the revenues for these Andalusian fields had long ago been impropriated by bankers and tax farmers, though usually from the same families as the prelates themselves.

 

5. falchion — slightly curved broadsword

He pulled his falchion up over his head and yelled, “For the last time, man, yield or die!”

 

6. dross — worthless matter, refuse

Gresham’s Law seems to indicate that the dross will take over money if it is not removed from circulation, which bodes ill, perhaps, for cryptocurrencies and that ilk.

 

7. tintamarre — ruckus, brouhaha; Acadian tradition of marching through village while using noisemakers and voices to make a stir

Gone are the days when political conventions decided anything save things that aren’t fit for TV nor print, and even the ‘spontaneous’ tintamarres which ‘break out’ on the convention floor are fully scripted events worthy of a Stalin or a Mao.

 

8. lustrine — glossy fabric of silk; lutestring

This quarter saw a sharp increase in the amount of lustrine imported from the Orient, doubtless because of the late changes in Paris fashion.

 

9. temerity — overconfidence, recklessness

“First you have the temerity to go ahead with your scheme after I’ve given you specific instructions not to, and now I find you’ve involved my daughter in this foolish and possibly actionable ploy.”

 

10. tignon — woman’s headcovering using a cloth to make a sort of turban, first worn by Creoles in Louisiana

From the folds of her tignon she pulled a very small card of thick blue paper, and handed it to me.

 

Bonus Vocabulary

(Christian)

Eutychus — youth who fell asleep (from boredom?) during one of Paul’s long sermons, fell out a 3rd-story window, died, and was brought back to life by Paul [Acts 20:7-12]

During Fidel Castro’s lengthy homilies, many a Eutychus struggled to stay awake, or at least to appear so, lest eternal rest be given as a fatal reward.

 

1. vestryman — council member of the local parish

Caught in flagrante delicto, as it were, Humber cooly placed the rubber balls in his trouser pockets and wished the vestrymen a good day.

 

2. ghyll — [UK] ravine, gully

Few go to Piers Ghyll now for the hiking, though once this was an important stop in the ‘English Switzerland’.

 

3. mereological — of or related to the study of relations between the whole and its component parts

This sort of mereological analysis can be useful in limited cases, as when the dissected parts reveal the paucity of ideas which gave rise to a movement such as that we have been considering.

 

4. bromide — chemical compound based upon bromine; medicament from such a compound, esp. lithium bromide, formerly used as antidepressant at beginning of 20th C.; platitude; dullard

But these are just the bromides of our modern age, on everyone’s lips and meaning almost nothing.

 

5. lenify — to soothe; to soften

Thus a kind word gently offered may lenify the searing pain of loss and mollify the injured heart.

 

6. foreland — headland, promontory; land adjacent to mountains where material has been deposited from the peaks by action of plate tectonics

His first major contract was for the construction of warning lights to be placed upon the foreland of the Presompter Peninsula, twenty miles south of Barnhumble.

 

7. chouse — [obsolete] to cheat, to swindle

It’s all very well and good to say that the whole rigamarole was jolly fun, but the fact remains that I’ve been choused out of two horses, a rooster, and a pot of my best marmalade.

 

8. scammony — bindweed of eastern Mediterranean; resin made from its root, used as a purgative

Though of course scammony can be dangerous in high doses, it is singularly effective against roundworm, exhibiting anthelmintic powers against tapeworm as well.

 

9. rorqual — baleen whale of the largest taxonomic family

A stately rorqual—a blue whale—swam unconcernedly next to the ice shoals, unaffected by the freezing water that had nearly ended the life of our clumsy cabin boy.

 

10. haviour (also haveour) — [obsolete] countenance, demeanor

Show not the haviour of your desperate need, but resolve right well to unconcerned appear.

 

11. venifice — [obsolete] poisoning

Because the murder was attempted by venefice it was felt to be particularly heinous.

 

Bonus Vocabulary

(Latin)

deus otiosus — deity which no longer interacts at all with humans after once creating the world and starting it in motion

But Staney’s argument is merely the same idea of a deus otiosus who has left the field for other, lesser divinities—’divinities’ which may, as he expresses it, merely be human-created facets of hopes for the divine, rather than any overarching power itself.

 

1. hustle-cap — old penny pitching game where coins are shaken in a cap

In the colonial days of Pennsylvania there is even one report of a deadlocked jury determining their verdict by playing a quick game of hustle-cap.

 

2. tomelet — small tome

The new (1929) tomelet from the World’s Classics Library containing the finally completed 1894 translations of The Apocrypha provides a handsome and inexpensive addition to any home religious library.

 

3. levin — [archaic] lightning, bright flash of light

Beneath the accusing levin-bolt of his stare Jenks could hardly stand, and near fell to the floor.

 

4. paillette — sequins

The paillettes on the shoulders of her drum majorette outfit were suspiciously worn.

 

5. folletto — imp, fairy

All the girls at the school were convinced that Catarina’s father—who everyone knew was a magician—had bound a folletto to brush his daughter’s hair each night, and that was the reason that her tresses were always so gorgeously smooth.

 

6. didicoy — gypsy, esp. non-Romani traveler

When Ellen found her best skirt gone from the clothesline, she immediately suspected the didicoys that had moved into the abandoned barn on the other side of the stream.

 

7. angiography — x-ray of blood or lymph vessels using radiopaque stuff

We’ll use angiography to confirm the suspected intracranial aneurysm.

 

8. oik — [UK slang] oaf; lower class person

We thought the plumbers were a bunch of oiks until we caught them arguing Wittgenstein versus Derrida one afternoon at their lunchtime.

 

9. theriomorphic — of animal or beastly form

Several theories have emerged to explain the preponderance of theriomorphic deities in the pantheon of Ancient Egypt, none of which are entirely satisfactory.

 

10. derp — [slang] expressing notice of foolish act

“Welp, I just dropped the keys over the side of the canoe, derp.”

 

11. crwth (also crowd) — bowed instrument on rectangular frame employed by ancient Celts

Though our sources assure us that the crwth was once much used by the ancient bards, only two historical exemplars now exist.

 

Bonus Vocabulary

(1920s U.S. criminal slang)

Baumes rush — to leave the state of New York to avoid a third conviction, which under a state law sponsored by Caleb Baumes would lead to life imprisonment

Baumes rush had brought him out to Los Angeles to start working on a new hat trick of crimes.

 

1. bonhomous — cheerful, full of bonhomie

But don’t let his bonhomous front fool you, for inside that genial clumban lurks a cunning and devious mind, always set upon gaining profit and power by any means fair or foul.

 

2. slewfoot (also sluefoot) — [slang] detective, policeman; clumsy person

“Ain’t gonna let no tinhorn slewfoot tell me where I can eat or drink—I does what I please!”

 

3. ogdoad — group of eight, octet

Behind this Gang of Eight, the official ogdoad, as it were, was a mysterious figure only identified as ‘Alpha’.

 

4. strake — [nautical] continuous line of planking from bow to stern in a ship’s hull

The garboard strakes are necessarily wider than most strakes at ship’s end, and should be of the strongest wood available.

 

5. analogon — analog, thing related by analogy to something else

Preston took St. Paul’s analogon of society as a human body to be ideally true, assuming to each member both needfulness and diversity in function, capability, and purpose.

 

6. erotetic — of or pertaining to questions or questioning

Focused on the erotetic value of these explanations, Herr Füssbacher makes a strong case for the development of the early rites from the devastating experience of droughts in this region, though Professor Edelman reproves this notion as giving too little weight to religious and psychic impulses which may be difficult if not impossible for we moderns to comprehend.

 

7. lummox — clumsy dummy

“Just stand still, you big lummox!” he growled, “If you break another one of her objects duh art we’ll be out on our ears for sure!”

 

8. concinnity — well-adapted and harmonious arrangement of parts (in musical work, in logical argument, etc.)

But in Lipstick Traces there is also a tremendous concinnity of argument and exposition in his delineation of the connections between the punk rock of the late ’70s and the Dada movement born after World War I, a harmonious convergence of history and music and art which in his narrative builds to a formidable and resonant whole.

 

9. amphigory — nonsense verse, meaningless writing

Are these poems, then, windows into a deeper nature and understanding, as the Surrealists claimed, or merest amphigory, a tremendous confidence trick played upon the literate public?

 

10. salutatorian — graduating high school student with second highest academic record

Coxey always bragged of being the salutatorian of his graduating class, but never mentioned that there were only forty students in the whole school that year, after that situation with the balloons of gin and the strange Swedish bus driver.

 

11. grosgrain — silk fabric having narrow ribs; ribbon made from such fabric

One of the new grosgrain berets will travel better, having no wire frame, and will keep you looking smart this season.

 

Bonus Vocabulary

(Black 20th C. slang, sometimes derogatory and sometimes merely descriptive)

ofay — white person

The club was owned by some ofay who installed a time clock by the back door and insisted the bartenders clock out every time they took a smoke break, and Freddy said he’d wanted to hook up the door lock to the clock until the Fire Marshal told him no.

 

1. beg the question — to assume the conclusion in a premise of a logical argument*

But to claim that the Holy Bible—and specifically the King James translation in English of the Hebrew, Aramaic, and Koine Greek originals—is the direct word of God, is merely to beg the question when this assertion is used to ‘prove’ that Christian holy writ has priority over all other religious texts.

 

2. ostinato — musical phrase or rhythm which is repeated over and over again

So strong was the ostinato of “The Ecstasy of Gold” that it became a staple of raves and (of course) television advertisements, sometimes even without the accompanying melodic line—though almost always with the trumpets.

 

3. prevenient — coming before in time, antecedent

His years in customer service proved prevenient preparation for his new role as the father of twins.

 

4. pi — to jumble or spill printing type

Be sure to allow adequate space around your type stand and imposing table, else you will be piing type quite frequently.

 

5. orison — prayer

At this time his only orisons consisted of muttered expletives uttered daily as he awoke, once again late for work.

 

6. stamping ground (also stomping ground) — hangout, haunt, frequented place

When Joey stopped at the Waffle House at the Redola Mill exit, once the favorite stamping ground of all his high school friends, he was surprised at how small, how dingy it appeared.

 

7. griffin — legendary beast with a lion’s body and an eagle’s head and wings

In honor of his heritage Bertram got a Pomeranian griffin tattooed on the back of his left calf, though I’m not sure if it’s the German or Polish ancestors he is honoring.

 

8. foible — minor quirk or idiosyncrasy; weakness of character; weaker half of sword blade (between middle and the point)

He’s a man of many foibles and for God’s sake whatever you do don’t mention gluten.

 

9. unctuous — excessively polite or flattering, smarmy; oily, greasy

Cooked in this way, the rabbit has a deliciously unctuous flavor, and the resulting gravy can be saved for use on chops and vegetables later.

 

10. unweeting — [obsolete] unwitting

But this lover’s beloved unweeting was of his undying love.

 

11. muleteer — mule driver

Though he had provided all the beasts himself, our muleteer could not make any of the pack animals move at all, and offered to return his hire money.

 

Bonus Vocabulary

(tech business term, coined by Cory Doctorow)

enshittification — process by which tech products go from initially good offerings to successively worse iterations until they become nearly unusable, in response to business customer needs and then shareholder demands for greater and greater profitability

Brandon had recently switched to DuckDuckGo, he said, in response to the ongoing enshittification of Google Search which made it impossible for him to do his historical research without trudging through acres of advertisements and paid links, all claiming to tell him the truth about the connection of aliens to the Byzantine Empire.

 

*other supposed ‘definitions’ based on common usage are not recognized by Educated Guesswork, and no cognizance will be taken of them in Friday Vocabulary

1. campanology — study of bells and their making, ringing, etc.

After enlisting the minister’s support in refocusing your church on the wonders of campanology, you shouldn’t immediately seek to introduce grandsire doubles to your bellringers.

 

2. veneer — thin layer of decorative wood, usu. placed over other cheaper wood; layer of wood used to make plywood; superficial attractive surface covering less attractive substance beneath

It wasn’t the lack of a plum in his mouth that betrayed his lower class origins—that could have been cured with elocution lessons—but rather the grubby neediness to be liked and approved which he covered in a veneer of brash confidence, both of which made him unattractive to just those people from old money whom he wished to appeal to.

 

3. tansy — herb with yellow flowers; 17th century dish using tansy for seasoning

On either side of the path grew happy little patches of tansy and verbena.

 

4. oscitant — yawning, gaping; tired, drowsy

He seemed an oscitant fellow, nearly nodding off behind his lectern, but he became a veritable whirlwind the moment Taylor’s name was mentioned.

 

5. hincty (also hinkty) — smugly superior, conceited

“Ever since Cab Calloway told him he blew real good he’s been too hincty to sit in on our sessions at Pete’s.”

 

6. huarache — [Spanish] leather Mexican sandal

Of course he should have stopped talking such nonsense long before he felt his mother’s huarache slapping into the back of his head.

 

7. dacron — polyester material used for thread and cloth

He always looks sharp in his Dacron blend shirts and 100% Dacron slacks.

 

8. acerbly — sourly, bitterly

Of course she couldn’t leave it there and had to acerbly point out that she’d gotten three degrees in the same amount of time.

 

9. placket — slit in skirt or other clothing to facilitate putting on or taking off; pocket, esp. in a skirt; petticoat

The pants all had plackets with buttons, so that band members of various sizes could use and re-use the black trousers for years and years, no matter how much the waistlines diminished or grew.

 

10. decalcomania — transferring decals onto surfaces

But from fake tattoos her decalcomania moved on to decoupage and then to fabrics and grew and grew until every article of clothing in the house—even Billy’s athletic socks!—were covered in cheery slogans and cute images transferred from her burgeoning collection of iron-on decals.

 

11. cynosure — center of attention; guiding star

From almost the moment of their arrival in Peacock Village the Wilsons became the cynosure of all eyes, and they could hardly have a couple over for afternoon tea without starting new trends in fashion and politics.

 

Bonus Vocabulary

(British idiom)

plum in one’s mouth — speaking in a posh style associated with the upper class

We kept him around because he had a plum in his mouth from watching all those old actors like Gielgud and Guinness, though really he was just as naff as me.

 

1. marcescent — [botany] withered yet still attached

He still felt the pain when he thought of the door slamming his fingers during that drunken escapade, but also felt pride that his marcescent fingernails were still clinging stupidly to his fingertips, just as stubborn as he always was in the face of brute necessity.

 

2. slope — [British] to go surreptitiously

As soon as Dad turned back to his paper, I sloped out the back door, not wanting to be present when he noticed the broken vase.

 

3. sorites — [rhetoric] series of propositions or syllogisms where each conclusion becomes the subject of the next

Talking with Nana was like talking to an eight-year-old girl, in that every statement was sure to be followed by “Why?”, like some sort of infinite sorites in which like as not you’d end up with the very statement which had began the series, at which point you could be sure that Nana would once again simply say, “Why?”, though you could never be quite sure whether she noticed the infinite repetition or not.

 

4. sorb — fruit-bearing deciduous tree of the old world, the service tree; the fruit of this tree

Both the sorb and the medlar ripen only off the tree, and the sorb in particular attains a delicious mellow flavor about a month after being stored up.

 

5. astragal — anklebone; bead-shaped molding; molding at junction of double doors to prevent drafts

Copies of the astragal (or even the bone itself) were used by children down through the ages to play games similar to dice or jacks.

 

6. philoprogenitive — prolific, producing (many) offspring; of or relating to love of one’s offspring

Originally constructed as a maternity hospital, with three floors of birthing rooms and eight more of singles and doubles for the new and prospective mothers, this philoprogenitive brick structure had been converted to a more general hospital as the baby boom subsided.

 

7. pollard — to prune a tree almost back to its trunk so as to produce massed branches

One of the pollarded willows had either been pruned poorly, or had some other deficiency, as its branches seemed thin and dying.

 

8. cockshut — [obsolete] twilight, evening

Andy planned to move at cockshut time, hoping that the gloaming might hide his movements from the patrols.

 

9. hent — [obsolete] to seize, to take

This potroon, who the style of king has hent, shall trouble these green hills no more after tomorrow morn.

 

10. jessie — [UK slang] sissy, coward, effeminate boy or man

“So I told the little jessie if he wanted his money back he could fight me for it, and that’s the last I heard of him, innit?”

 

11. legicentric — organized around and dedicated to the supremacy of statutes and the law

In the seemingly infinite regulations of the European Union one can see the influence of the French État idéal, the legicentric state where primacy must always be given the the law, even if the rules promulgated have precious little to do with the reality of life as lived by most of its subjects.

 

Bonus Vocabulary

(French)

en grande tenue — in full dress uniform, in elegant style

Though she may keep a household almost filthy by our standards, this woman of the working class will be seen on a Sunday always en grande tenue, wearing clothes and jewelry that might feed her hungry children for months.