pantofle, n. : “A slipper for the foot” (Webster). (Pronounced pan-tah’-ful or pan-toe’-ful). This word has origins from several languages, not limited to the ones Webster lists. He mentions French, Italian, Spanish, Swedish, Danish, and Russian, each of which has a slightly different rendering of the word (such as pantuflo in Spanish and tufel in […]
Bellibone
bellibone, n. : “A woman excelling both in beauty and goodness” (Webster). (Pronounced bell’-i-bone, with the accent on bell, and bone pronounced as it’s spelled. Fun fact—with a British accent, it sounds like belly-bone.) When I first saw this word, a lovely young lady certainly did not come to mind. The word itself is not […]
Mazarine
mazarine, n. : “A deep blue color” (Pronounced like Nazarene or tangerine with the accent on the first syllable or the third, whichever you prefer [maz’a-reen or maz-a-reen’]) (Thanks again, Noah Webster!) There are at least two reasons I picked this word. The first is that since you don’t hear it every day, you will sound […]
Accoy ~ First Weekly Word!
Our first weekly word is accoy. But before I talk about it, I want to mention a really great book—Noah Webster’s 1828 American Dictionary of the English Language. It is replete with colorful, vivid, old-fashioned words like accoy that you have probably never heard of (Microsoft Word and I hadn’t anyway—squiggly red lines galore!). I […]
