Word of the Day
rufescent
adjective
somewhat reddish; tinged with red; rufous.
More about rufescent
Rufescent “somewhat reddish” comes from the Latin verb rūfescere “to redden,” which is formed from the adjective rūfus “red, tawny” and the inchoative infix -esc- “to become, to begin to be.” Our longtime followers should be well acquainted by now with the infix -esc-, which has cropped up in the recent Words of the Day iridescent, evanesce, and violescent. There are numerous words for “red” in Latin, but among the best-known terms are ruber, rubeus, rūfus, and russus. In English, ruber gives us rubella, after the typical red rash, as well as rubric, because instructions in legal and religious texts were once often written in red ocher. Rubeus is the source of ruby and (via French) rouge, while descendants of russus include russet as well as roux (from French beurre roux “browned butter”) and the names Rousseau and Russell (from French roux “redhead”). Rufescent was first recorded in English in the 1810s.
how is rufescent used?
From Queensboro Bridge Park, his gaze shifts back to center and the dusty rufescent brown chain link fence momentarily pops back into focus—its color not unlike that of dried blood, a darker version of the still coagulating reds covering the arches over on the Hell Gate and Roosevelt Island Bridges; except for the Triborough, which is the cool blue of a corpse in livor mortis, the paths to Queens seen here are all seemingly slathered in blood—before his eyes can adjust to their target, the slowly moving water below.
Enter the grove, and it is like walking into a vast, dimly lit dome with sunlight barely filtering through the canopy of incredibly old trees, many with a thick covering of green moss and lichen, and others with a decoration of wildflowers and orchids of various species. The floor is covered with a carpet of rotting, rufescent leaves, several inches thick, judging from the way one’s feet sink into them. The atmosphere is as peaceful and solemn as a house of worship. One can hear only the calming sounds of the forest.
philtrum
noun
the vertical groove on the surface of the upper lip, below the septum of the nose.
More about philtrum
Philtrum “the vertical groove on the surface of the upper lip” is a Latinized version of Ancient Greek phíltron, of the same meaning. However, phíltron could also mean “love potion,” and it is this sense that is preserved in the English term philter (not to be confused with the unrelated homophone filter, which is of Germanic origin). Phíltron is formed from the adjective phílos (stem phil-) “loving, dear” and the suffix -tron, which—as an instrumental suffix—roughly translates as “thing that does/is used for something.” The stem phil- (also philo-) is the source of dozens of words in English, from philosophy (“love of wisdom”) and philanthropy (“love of humankind”) to Philadelphia (“brotherly love”) and Philip (“love of horses”). Philtrum was first recorded in English in the first decade of the 17th century.
how is philtrum used?
The early human embryo looks very similar to the embryo of any other mammal, bird or amphibian—all of which have evolved from fish. Your eyes start out on the sides of your head, but then move to the middle. The top lip along with the jaw and palate started life as gill-like structures on your neck. Your nostrils and the middle part of your lip come down from the top of your head. There is no trace of a scar; the plates of tissue and muscle fuse seamlessly. But there is, however, a little remnant of all this activity in the middle of your top lip—your philtrum.
[Channing Tatum] likes everywhere he’s ever been—every phase, every fad, every quirk of life in the fringes of large American cities. He makes being a latchkey kid in lower-middle-class Tampa sound like a picaresque novel …. And while I’m listening, I grab my last crab end-to-end and split it with one hand. It crumbles a little, then snaps open and sprays Tatum with a spritz of crab juice straight in his million-dollar philtrum, lips and all …. To the credit of his everlasting graciousness, Tatum plays it off, pretends he doesn’t notice.
nubilous
adjective
cloudy or foggy.
More about nubilous
Nubilous “cloudy or foggy” derives from Latin nūbilus “cloudy, overcast,” equivalent to the noun nūbēs “cloud” and the adjectival suffix -ilus. Nūbēs is also, by way of French, the source of English nuance, which originally referred to literal shades and hues. As we learned from last year’s Word of the Day obnubilate, though nūbēs and Latin nebula sound similar and both mean “cloud,” the two words are unrelated; the stark difference between their vowels cannot be explained through regular historical sound changes. Though it is uncertain whether nūbēs has any cognates in English that are of Anglo-Saxon or general Germanic origin, there is a small “cloud”-related rabbit hole that we can explore: the Old Norse word for “cloud” is ský, which—you guessed it—was borrowed into English as sky. Nubilous was first recorded in English circa 1530.
how is nubilous used?
I thought the tree was just…standing there. That is true enough in winter, when the oak is dormant. But the rest of the year, its plumbing surges with food and water, coursing up, down, and out, in a living, interactive connection to the earth, sky, and sun …. Its canopy is minutely nubilous with freshly made oxygen and drifting water vapor released from millions of pores in a mist so fine we cannot see or smell it.
The water swirled around him and he panicked, unable to tell up from down …. Is this what Florence had felt like, frightened and alone in a dark cocoon of briny water? Isaac felt something bump against his back. Was it the boat? A piece of driftwood? He tried to grasp it, couldn’t. But then he felt someone grab him from behind and realized Stuart had found him—miraculously—in the nubilous water.