recalcitrant \rih-KAL-sih-truhnt\ (adjective) - Stubbornly resistant to and defiant of authority or restraint.

"The driver, recognizing Emerson, managed to stop the recalcitrant animal before it ran into my equally recalcitrant spouse." -- Elizabeth Peters, 'The Golden One'

Recalcitrant derives from Latin recalcitrare, "to kick back," from re-...Read more

quondam \KWAHN-duhm; KWAHN-dam\ (adjective) - Having been formerly; former; sometime.

"O, you my lord! By Mars his gauntlet, thanks!
Mock not that I affect th'untraded oath;
Your quondam wife swear still by Venus' glove.
She's well, but bade me not commend her to you." -- William Shakespeare, 'Troilus and Cressida'

Quondam ...Read more

pellucid \puh-LOO-sid\ (adjective) - 1 : Transparent; clear; not opaque. 2 : Easily understandable.

"Maybe this person is apparently mysterious while being pellucid, or apparently pellucid while being mysterious." -- Sue Miller, 'While I Was Gone'

Pellucid comes from Latin pellucidus, "shining, transparent," from pellucere, "to shine through,"...Read more

desuetude \DES-wih-tood, -tyood\ (noun) - The cessation of use; discontinuance of practice or custom; disuse.

"Though access for such purposes had formerly been denied, the custom had fallen into desuetude; and in contemplating her possible difficulties, she was again almost driven to fall back upon her husband." -- Thomas Hardy, 'The Withered ...Read more

bailiwick \BAY-luh-wik\ (noun) - 1 : A person's specific area of knowledge, authority, interest, skill, or work. 2 : The office or district of a bailiff.

"I'm all of that, Skye. I'm also King. This is my bailiwick. My word is law and my fists enforce it." -- Richard S. Wheeler, 'Rendezvous'

Bailiwick comes from Middle English baillifwik, from ...Read more

pervicacious \puhr-vih-KAY-shuhs\ (adjective) - Refusing to change one's ideas, behavior, etc.; stubborn; obstinate.

"May they be efficacious upon the mind of one of the most pervicacious young creatures that ever was heard of!" -- Samuel Ricardson, 'Clarissa Harlowe'

ervicacious is from Latin pervicax, pervicac-, "stubborn, headstrong," from ...Read more

inexorable \in-EK-sur-uh-bul; in-EKS-ruh-bul\ (adjective) - Not to be persuaded or moved by entreaty or prayer; firm; determined; unyielding; unchangeable; inflexible; relentless.

"As he watched -- with a sense of seeing inexorable, inevitable movement which made everything seem to slow down to an unbearable slowness -- the little weapons ...Read more

connubial \kuh-NOO-bee-ul; -NYOO-\ (adjective) - Of or pertaining to marriage, or the marriage state; conjugal; nuptial.

"How many men can truly assert that they ever enjoy connubial flows of soul, or that connubial feasts of reason are in their nature enjoyable?" -- Anthony Trollope, 'Framley Parsonage'

Connubial comes from Latin conubialis, ...Read more

solicitous \suh-LIS-uh-tuhs\, adjective) - 1 : Manifesting or expressing care or concern. 2 : Full of anxiety or concern; apprehensive. 3 : Extremely careful; meticulous. 4 : Full of desire; eager.

"I listened with closed eyes to his solicitous words, though he never noticed it." -- Par Lagerkvist, 'The Sibyl'

Solicitous is from Latin ...Read more

rivulet \RIV-yuh-lut\ (noun) - A small stream or brook; a streamlet.

"In this extremity, continuing his walk, he discovered a rivulet of the purest water, of which he copiously drank." -- Charles Swan, ' Gesta Romanorum'

Rivulet is from Italian rivoletto, diminutive of rivolo, from Latin rivulus, diminutive of rivus, "a brook, a stream."

tutelary \TOO-tuh-lair-ee; TYOO-\ (adjective) - Having the guardianship or charge of protecting a person or a thing; guardian; protecting; as, "tutelary goddesses."

"But there is a tutelary deity for misers, and by a chain of unforeseen circumstances that tutelary deity was so ordering matters that the purchase-money of his extortionate bargian...Read more

rusticate \RUHS-tih-kayt\ (intransitive verb) - 1 : To go into or reside in the country; to pursue a rustic life.

(transitive verb) - 1 : To require or compel to reside in the country; to banish or send away temporarily. 2 : (Chiefly British). To suspend from school or college. 3 : To build with usually rough-surfaced masonry blocks having ...Read more

terminus \TUR-muh-nuhs\ (noun) - 1 : The finishing point; the end. 2 : A boundary; a border; a limit. 3 : A post or stone marking a boundary. 4 : Either end of a railroad or other transportation line; also, the station house, town, or city at that place.

"It had been almost two T-centuries since the Basilisk terminus of the Manticoran Wormhole ...Read more

fustian \FUHS-chuhn\ (noun) - 1 : A kind of coarse twilled cotton or cotton and linen stuff, including corduroy, velveteen, etc. 2 : An inflated style of writing or speech; pompous or pretentious language.

(adjective) - 1 : Made of fustian. 2 : Pompous; ridiculously inflated; bombastic.

"Even in fustian garments nobility hides with difficulty ...Read more

expunge \ik-SPUNJ\, transitive verb) - 1 : To strike out, erase, or mark for deletion; to obliterate; as, "to expunge words, lines, or sentences." 2 : To wipe out or destroy; to annihilate.

"He hated to expunge the odor of burnt things, seared paint, smoke, which tasted to him of the heroism so elusive in the daily turn of men's lives." -- ...Read more

superannuated \soo-pur-AN-yoo-ay-tid\, adjective) - 1 : Discharged or disqualified on account of old age; retired from service, especially with a pension. 2 : Old; no longer in use; no longer valid; outmoded.

"The worthy man was hale and hearty, not exceeding three score and seven, and had never dreamt of being superannuated." -- John Galt, '...Read more

lubricious \loo-BRISH-us\ (adjective) - 1 : Lustful; lewd. 2 : Stimulating or appealing to sexual desire or imagination. 3 : Having a slippery or smooth quality.

"Now, having sloughed His old skin, glistening with youth, he puffs out His breast and slides his lubricious coils Toward the sun, flicking his three-forked tongue." -- Virgil, '...Read more

hebetude \HEB-uh-tood-; -tyood\ (noun) - Mental dullness or sluggishness.

"From that solitude, full of despair and terror, he was torn out brutally, with kicks and blows, passive, sunk in hebetude." -- Joseph Conrad, 'Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard'

Hebetude derives ultimately from Latin hebes, "blunt, dull, mentally dull, sluggish, stupid."...Read more

acuity \uh-KYOO-uh-tee\ (noun) - Acuteness of perception or vision; sharpness.

"Center's visual acuity gave Adrian a degree of accuracy which was far greater than that of any normal slinger, even an expert one." -- Eric Flint, 'The Tyrant'

Acuity comes from Latin acutus, "sharpened, pointed, acute," past participle of acuere, "to sharpen."

We celebrate Noah Webster as a founding father of American English because his 1828 dictionary was the first to include words, meanings and spellings that were unique to the United States. But another 19th-century American was Webster's equal as a linguistic pioneer: Mark Twain.

As his biographer Ron Powers has observed, Twain was a "...Read more