Exquisite Words

Part 3: When you're looking for just the right one. (Vol. 2; Issue 36)

Welcome aboard The Bus!

The Stop

Welcome to the third instalment of Exquisite Words. The first instalment (1.47) looked at acheiropoeita, chthonic, quincunx and quodlibet - and the second (2.16) at hacceity, nihil ex nihilo fit and qualia. Each time I challenged Bus Riders to use them in a sentence and the second time around Mark did!¹ Having recently been teaching a lot of Coleridge, I’ve been immersed in the language of the late 18th century and have discovered a number of new words. Consequently, today’s Exquisite Words are a selection of words that were in more or lesson common usage in his day: abligurition, amatorculist, cacoethes, and quaquaversal. As before, try to use them in a sentence and let me know how it goes!²

Untitled (2022)/Bryan Padrick

ABLIGURITION - A noun meaning extravagance, especially in matters of food or drink, abliguration is from the Latin abligurire (to squander on delicacies), which comes from ab- (away) + ligurire (to lick). Ultimately this word has its origin in the Indo-European root leigh- (lick) which gives us the words lichen (which evidently licks around the surface of a tree). In a sentence: ‘My abliguration backfired, for my date was repulsed by the excess.’

AMATORCULIST - This noun - from the Latin amatorculus (a little lover), the diminutive of amator (lover), which is from amor (love) - is the term for a pretend or insignificant lover. Samuel Johnson, in A Dictionary of the English Language (1755) defined an amatorculist as a ‘little insignificant lover; a pretender to affection.’ By 1867, it was defined by Joseph Wright in his Dictionary of Obsolete and Provincial English as a ‘wretched lover or galant.’ It’s a great word, but is definitely the word for the insignificant lover, not an insignificant love affair. That word is amourette. In a sentence: ‘Lonny thought he was the one, but to Sheila he was just another in a long line of amatorculists.’

CACOETHES - A noun from the Latin cacoēthes, itself from the Greek kakos (bad) + ethe (disposition), cacoethes is the irresistible urge to do something inadvisable. Kakos is ultimately from the Indo-European root kaka- (to defecate), which kind of puts the negativity of this word into perspective. In a sentence: ‘Despite having quit years ago, whenever I smell the smoke I have a cacoethes for a cigarette.’

QUAQUAVERSAL - From the Latin qua (in what direction), which led to quaqua (in all directions) + versus (towards), which comes from vertere (to turn), quaquaversal is an adjective meaning ‘sloping downward from a centre in all directions.’ Though generally used in geology to describe a feature ‘directed outward from a common centre toward all points of the compass’ or ‘dipping uniformly in all directions,’ it was originally an architectural term describing the descent of a dome from its centre. In a sentence: ‘Fig. 1 is an outstanding example of a quaquaversal dome.’

Fig. 1: St. Paul’s Cathedral, London

The Detour

Today’s Detour is to a video (15:20) in which the English musician Jacob Collier answers a number of questions about music theory using his keyboard and voice. It’s an interesting watch - and there is an ad break about half-way through, but only for a few seconds - and he answers questions about reharmonisation, the function of piano pedals, the circle of fifths, and what exactly is timbre among many others.

Jacob Collier Answers Music Theory Questions

The Recommendation

Today’s recommendation is Simon Winchester’s The Meaning of Everything: The Story of the Oxford English Dictionary (2003). The story of the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary, it is a surprisingly thrilling read - best described by the inside flap:

‘The greatest enterprise of its kind in history,’ declared British Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin in June 1922 about the publication of the monumental book that was to crown the English language the undisputed monarch of the linguistic world: the Oxford English Dictionary.

The making of the Dictionary was a remarkable achievement by hundreds of ordinary and extraordinary men and women, whose stories have until now remained untold. Simon Winchester illuminates this diverse cast of characters for the first time, uniting original research and evidence from the Oxford University Press archives with gripping narrative flair.

In witty and absorbing prose, he paints lively portraits of such key figures as the brilliant but tubercular first editor Herbert Coleridge (grandson of the poet), the colourful, boisterous Frederick Furnivall (sometimes remembered for his fondness for his female sculling team), and James Augustus Henry Murray, who spent a half-century bringing the project to fruition. The story traces the origins of the English language and the first attempts to catalogue it, the growing desire for an all-inclusive dictionary, through to the triumphant publication of the first edition of the Dictionary in 1928 and beyond.

The Meaning of Everything is rich with captivating detail: how the word ‘aardvark’ narrowly missed inclusion after being deemed too ‘scientific’ and too ‘foreign,’ which editor of the Dictionary became the inspiration for Kenneth Grahame’s Ratty in The Wind in the Willows, why Tolkien found it so difficult to define ‘walrus,’ and how the word ‘bondmaid’ was missed out of the first edition simply because the piece of paper on which it was written had fallen behind a pile of books.

With his characteristic gift for storytelling, Simon Winchester brings one of the most fascinating of forgotten histories to life.

Remember: You can buy The Meaning of Everything at Amazon, but you can also get it from your local new or used bookstore - or check it out from the library. And those options are better for everyone.

The Sounds

Today’s playlist is a selection of five tracks that - for the first time in several Stops - have nothing to do with the topic at all, but are just ones that have found themselves on my current playlist: ‘The Scientist - Cover’ (Bird and Byron, 2023), ‘I Think It’s Gonna Rain’ (Butch Bastard, 2022), ‘Light Me Up’ (Illiterate Light, 2023), ‘Tropic Morning News’ (The National, 2023) and ‘In Water’ (Bay Ledges, 2022).³

The Thought

Today’s Thought is from the Danish Existentialist philosopher Søren Kierkegaard:⁴

‘Most men pursue pleasure with such breathless haste that they hurry past it.’

If you have a thought on this Thought - or any part of today’s issue - please leave a comment below:

And that’s the end of this stop - I hope you enjoyed the diversion!

Thanks to everyone who subscribes - your interest and support is truly appreciated. If you like The Bus, please SHARE it with a friend or two. 

If you haven’t climbed aboard The Bus, please do!

Until the next stop …

1. You can read it in the Comments section for that issue.

2. Sources for today’s Stop include Wordsmith.org, Words at Play and Collins Dictionary.

3. I heard the first four tracks from this week's issue of

Zappagram

. Published weekly, the self-proclaimed 'Mother of All Music Newsletters' does exactly what it says on the tin - original articles, the latest news, interesting links and recommendations and - my favourite bit - a new playlist every time. Give it a read - you won't regret it!

4. Kierkegaard was the topic of a previous Bus Stop (see: 1.17 - 2 June 2022), and seems to becoming a regular Thought contributor. For more information, see: Kierkegaard (Britannica).