Most word-of-the-day services, emails or other vocabulary building tools are pretty wimpy in my snotty opinion so I have a running list of new words I keep in a note file on Evernote. See my blog post about how I approach reading and vocabulary collection using index cards, a pen or pencil, and Evernote.
When I remember I’ll throw a new work into the sidebar of this blog and archive the old ones on this page in case you want to throw a bookmark at it. Submissions welcome:
Percipient: adjective
1. (of a person) having a good understanding of things; perceptive.
“he is a percipient interpreter of the public mood”
noun
2. (especially in philosophy or with reference to psychic phenomena) a person who is able to perceive things.
Deodand: noun
A thing forfeited or given to God, specifically, in law, an object or instrument which becomes forfeit because it has caused a person’s death.
Subfusc: adj.
1. Dull or gloomy; having subdued colors.
2. noun: formal clothing worn for exams and special occasions by academics and students in Great Britain.
Vulturine: adj.
- Pertaining to vultures.
- Predaceous.
Titivate:verb
1. make small enhancing alterations to (something).
“she slapped on her warpaint and titivated her hair”
2. make oneself look attractive.
Calentures: noun
A feverish delirium formerly supposed to affect sailors in the tropics
Timoneer: noun
Helmsman
French timonier, from timon (“a helm”), from Latin temo, temonis (“a pole”).