Word of the Day
belvedere
noun
a building, or architectural feature of a building, designed and situated to look out upon a pleasing scene.
More about belvedere
Belvedere, “a building, or architectural feature of a building, designed and situated to look out upon a pleasing scene,” comes straight from Italian belvedere “beautiful view,” a compound of bel, bello “beautiful” (from Latin bellus “pretty, charming”) and the infinitive vedere “to see” (from Latin vidēre), here used as a noun meaning “view or sight.” In Italian architecture a belvedere is an upper story, or part of one, or even a small tower or kiosk that is open to the air on at least one side, affording a pleasing view and an opportunity to enjoy the cool air of the evening. Belvedere entered English in the first half of the 16th century.
how is belvedere used?
In the early evening time Doctor Kemp was sitting in his study in the belvedere on the hill overlooking Burdock. … For a minute perhaps he sat, pen in mouth, admiring the rich golden colour above the crest ….
For them, it’s enough to sit in the belvedere and watch the tide turning and the geese migrating with the seasons.
More about shivoo
Shivoo “a loud party” is an Australian colloquialism of uncertain origin. An earlier spelling, shiveau, appears at the end of the 18th century in the U.K. The nearly 20 spelling variants, including chevaux and cheveaux, lead some scholars to suggest that the origin of shivoo may be from the French phrase chez vous “at your house.” The Australian spelling shivoo dates from 1881.
how is shivoo used?
The place was packed, there being more people present than at any previous moment of this festival … “What a show, Brian! What a shivoo! You can’t go to sleep yet. Here, I’ve brought you a drink to toast Old Ireland with.”
In that traditional lull between reporting season and the start of annual meetings, the balance of Australia’s most senior chief executives are clocking up air miles and enjoying the hospitality of investment bank JP Morgan at its annual Edinburgh shivoo.
paucity
noun
smallness of quantity; scarcity; scantiness.
More about paucity
Paucity “smallness of quantity; scarcity; scantiness,” comes via Old or Middle French paucité from Latin paucitāt-, the inflectional stem of paucitās “smallness of quantity; scarcity; scantiness,” a derivative of the adjective paucus “few” (because of its intrinsic meaning, paucus is usually used in the plural). Paucus is also the source of Italian poco “a little,” i.e., the musical direction meaning “somewhat, a little,” and of poco a poco “little by little, gradually.” The Proto-Indo-European root underlying the Latin words is pau-, pōu-, pəu-, pu– (with still more variants) “few, a few, little, low,” which also usually is extended by consonant suffixes. Latin pau– with a suffixed –l forms the adjective paulus, paullus “little, small,” the Roman surname Paullus, and the English forename Paul. The variant root pu– with a suffixed –er forms the Latin noun puer “boy, child”; the diminutive of puer is puellus “a young boy,” and puella, the feminine of puellus, therefore means “girl.” The root pau– becomes the Proto-Germanic root faw-; its derived adjective fawaz “few, a little,” becomes fēawa, fēa in Old English, and few in modern English. Paucity entered English in the first half of the 15th century.
how is paucity used?
Watching American films from the 1970s today, you may be struck by the paucity of music: filmmakers then did not want to depend on the emotional groundbase a continuous music track provides—they wanted to focus your attention on their images.
Ambiguous references to what may have been hats of vegetable materials are to be found in the works of almost all ancient writers, but very little that is specific can be discovered. Perhaps one reason for the paucity of information on this subject may be that the homemade hats of plaited straws or rushes were probably worn only by the common people.