Word - 165

REMORA \rih-MOR-uh\ noun

*1 : any of various marine fishes that have a suction disk on the head by means of which they cling especially to other fishes

2 : hindrance, drag

Example sentence:
Remoras feed on parasites culled from their host's skin and scraps from their host's meals.

Did you know?

Also known as "shark suckers" or "suckerfish," remoras are long, thin, dark fishes that are distributed throughout the world in warm seas. Ancient sailors believed remoras had the power to slow or even stop a ship by attaching themselves to it; the name "remora," which means "delay" in Latin, arose from this ancient superstition. The poor remora's reputation isn’t much better today. Even though remoras don't harm their hosts, they are popularly thought of as unwanted guests who get a free ride and a free meal by way of the efforts of others. It is therefore common to see "remora" used metaphorically in such contexts as "hungry paparazzi who attach themselves like remoras to celebrities."

Word - 164

PRELAPSARIAN \pree-lap-SAIR-ee-un\ adjective

: characteristic of or belonging to the time or state before the fall of humankind

Example sentence:
In the afternoon we walked through the idyllic gardens, noting their prelapsarian charm.

Did you know?

"Prelapsarian" is the latest creation in the "lapsarian" family, which is etymologically related to Latin "lapsus," meaning "slip" or "fall." "Supralapsarian" is the firstborn, appearing in 1633 as a word for someone who held the belief that people were predestined to either eternal life or eternal death before the Creation and the Fall (the event in the Bible when Adam and Eve were forced to leave the Garden of Eden because they had sinned against God). Next in line is "sublapsarian," which refers to a person who adhered to the view that God foresaw and permitted the Fall and after the Fall decreed predestination to eternal life as a means of saving some of the human race. That word first appears in 1656 and was followed by its synonym, "infralapsarian," in distant 1731. "Postlapsarian," meaning "of, relating to, or characteristic of the time or state after the Fall," appeared two years later, and "prelapsarian" was delayed until 1879.

Word - 163

TOUCHSTONE \TUTCH-stohn\ noun

1 : a test or criterion for determining the quality or genuineness of a thing
*2 : a fundamental or quintessential part or feature

Example sentence:
The band was a touchstone of the grunge music scene in the 1990s.

Did you know?

Our example sentence uses "touchstone" in its most recently acquired sense: "a fundamental part." The earlier sense, "a criterion for quality" (as in "I Love Lucy is often seen as a touchstone for comparison with today's TV comedy shows"), provides a better clue to the original meaning of "touchstone," however. The "criterion" sense, which goes back more than 470 years, alludes to a method of testing the purity of a sample of gold. The sample was rubbed on a piece of dark quartz or jasper -- the "touchstone." The mark it made was compared to adjacent rubbings on the touchstone from gold of known purity. This method has proved accurate enough that touchstones are still used by jewelers today.

Word - 162

QUAGGY \KWAGG-ee\ adjective

*1 : marshy
2 : flabby

Example sentence:
"The alluring creeks and guts that cut through the quaggy archipelago are littered with too much manmade detritus." (The Baltimore Sun, August 20, 2006)

Did you know?

"Quaggy" is related to "quagmire," a word for a patch of wet land that feels soft underfoot, but etymologists are not sure where the first half of the latter word originates. Some have suggested that "quag" might be imitative, echoing the soft, mushy sound that wet ground makes when you walk on it. Both "quagmire" and the shorter noun "quag" first appeared in English in the 1580s, while "quaggy," which can describe land as well as other things lacking firmness, appeared about thirty years later.

Word - 161

HEBETUDE \HEB-uh-tood\ noun

: lethargy, dullness

Example sentence:
The hebetude and ennui displayed by such bright students was just one sign that they were not being sufficiently challenged in their classes.

Did you know?

"Hebetude" usually suggests mental dullness, often marked by laziness or torpor. As such, it was a good word for one Queenslander correspondent, who wrote in a letter to the editor of the Weekend Australian of "an epidemic of hebetude among young people who ... are placing too great a reliance on electronic devices to do their thinking and remembering." "Hebetude" comes from Late Latin "hebetudo," which means pretty much the same thing as our word. It is also closely related to the Latin word for "dull" -- "hebes," which has extended meanings such as "obtuse," "doltish," and "stupid." Other "hebe-" words in English include "hebetudinous" ("marked by hebetude") and "hebetate" ("to make dull").