This week we shall have a meander through the dictionary that will end up in a strange place – Fife.
I do enjoy reading a dictionary and collecting new words as I go, or words new to me anyway. Fitting them in to conversation can be tricky, but here are some of my recently discovered examples.
To wamble is to feel nausea. Your confinity is your neighbourhood. A dizain is a poem of 10 lines. Amability is lovableness. A kibe is an ulcerated chilblain. A barrico is a keg. Mesalliance is marriage to a person of inferior social rank.
Sideral means of the stars. To be siderate means to be planet-struck (which sounds serious). Traboccant is superabundant. Cassia is an inferior type of cinnamon. A gaudeamus is students merrymaking. A lethiferous thing causes death. The mistigris is the knave of spades.
Posology is the science of how much medicine to give. Selenology is science relating to the moon. Melissopalynology is the study of honey. Xiphoid is sword-shaped. Scaphoid is boat-shaped. Scyphoid is cup-shaped. Clithridiate is keyhole-shaped.
Tonk is to strike vigorously. An almoner is a bag. A remontant flower blooms more than once a season. A warrener looks after game (the type shot by rich, loud people). An alphonsin is a three-pronged instrument for extracting bullets from the body.
A yelm is a sheaf of straw for thatching. A yike is an imitation of a woodpecker’s call. To barr is to utter the cry of an elephant. To yerk is to pull stitches tightly.
If something is succiferous, it contains sap. A whiffler is a smoker of tobacco. A rigadoon is a lively dance. A periapt is a charm that you wear. Scraw is thin growth of grass atop a bog.
A zho is the calf of a male yak and ordinary cow. An onocentaur is a (mythological) being with a human torso and body of an ass. A Yowie is a Yeti-like creature said to traipse the Australian outback. A poissarde is a pickpocket.
A saulie is a hired mourner. A quincunx is a shape with four points at the corners and one in the middle, such as the five on a die. A die is one cube, two or more are dice.
I don’t want to get finifugal (fear of finishing) so I will, as promised, make my way to Fife. I must say, however, I do not make up dictionary entries be they teterrimous (most foul) or not. I merely report them.
My two-volume Shorter Oxford English was printed in 1969. I quote verbatim from page 696 of the A to M volume. It gives the definition of Fifish as: “the county of Fife+ish; applied orig. to people from that county. Somewhat deranged.”
Are those last two words fair? I know people from Fife and they aren’t – mind you, now I think on it . . .
Word of the week
Logophile (noun)
A lover of words. EG: “They might say I am a logophile, but I’m not so bad that I am Fifish.”
Read the latest Oh my word! every Saturday in The Courier. Contact me at sfinan@dctmedia.co.uk
