anaphora

 In rhetoric, an anaphora (Greek: ἀναφορά, "carrying back") is a rhetorical device that consists of repeating a sequence of words at the beginnings of neighboring clauses, thereby lending them emphasis. In contrast, an epistrophe (or epiphora) is repeating words at the clauses' ends. The combination of anaphora and epistrophe results in symploce. 

For want of a nail the shoe was lost.
For want of a shoe the horse was lost.
For want of a horse the rider was lost.
For want of a rider the message was lost.
For want of a message the battle was lost.
For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.
And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.

— "For Want of a Nail"

 

polylogy

 

polylogy (usually uncountable, plural polylogies)

1. (rare) A set of two or more works of art that are connected, and that can be seen either as a single work or as individual works. They are commonly found in literature, film, or video games.
2. (rare) Talkativeness.

oni

 An oni (鬼（おに）) (/oʊni/ OH-nee) is a kind of yōkai, demon, orc, ogre, or troll in Japanese folklore. They are believed to live in caves or deep in the mountains.

This oni (ogre) tramples a hapless villain in Beppu, Oita, Oita Prefecture, a famous onsen hot springs resort on the island of Kyushu in Japan.

👹

obdurate

 obdurate

stubbornly persistent in wrongdoing

elsewhen

 

elsewhen (not comparable)

(archaic) At some other time or times; somewhen else.

Adsorption

 Adsorption is the adhesion of atoms, ions or molecules from a gas, liquid or dissolved solid to a surface.

 Two adsorbate nitrogen molecules adsorbing onto a tungsten adsorbent from the precursor state around an island of previously adsorbed adsorbate (left) and via random adsorption (right)

frenulum

 A frenulum /ˈfrɛnjʊləm/ or frenum /ˈfriːnəm/ (pl.: frenula or frena, from the Latin frēnulum, "little bridle", the diminutive of frēnum) is a small fold of tissue that secures the motion of a mobile organ in the body. 

 

sangoma

 

sangoma n

(South Africa and other parts of Southern Africa) A (usually female) traditional healer or herbalist, or witch doctor.

molly wop

 

molly wop (third-person singular simple present molly wops, present participle molly wopping, simple past and past participle molly wopped)

1. (slang, transitive) To hit (someone) hard.

wolly

 

wolly (plural wollies)

1. (UK, slang) Alternative form of wally

rand

 

The South African rand, or simply the rand, (sign: R; code: ZAR) is the official currency of the Southern African Common Monetary Area: South Africa, Namibia (alongside the Namibian dollar), Lesotho (alongside the Lesotho loti) and Eswatini (alongside the Swazi lilangeni). It is subdivided into 100 cents (sign: "c") and the rand and cents are separated by a comma.

The South African rand is legal tender in the Common Monetary Area member states of Namibia, Lesotho and Eswatini, with these three countries also having their own national currency (the dollar, the loti and the lilangeni respectively) pegged with the rand at parity and still widely accepted as substitutes. The rand was also legal tender in Botswana until 1976, when the pula replaced the rand at par. 

 

 The rand takes its name from the Witwatersrand ("white waters' ridge" in English, rand being the Afrikaans word for 'ridge'), the ridge upon which Johannesburg is built and where most of South Africa's gold deposits were found. In English and Afrikaans the singular and plural form of the unit ("rand") is the same: one rand, ten rand, two million rand.

spume

 

spume (countable and uncountable, plural spumes)

Foam or froth of liquid, particularly that of seawater.

spave

 

spave (third-person singular simple present spaves, present participle spaving, simple past and past participle spaved)

1. Archaic form of spay (“remove the ovaries of an animal”).

patent troll

 In international law and business, patent trolling or patent hoarding is a categorical or pejorative term applied to a person or company that attempts to enforce patent rights against accused infringers far beyond the patent's actual value or contribution to the prior art, often through hardball legal tactics (frivolous litigation, vexatious litigation, strategic lawsuits against public participation (SLAPP), chilling effects, and the like).

Pachycauls

 Pachycauls are plants with a disproportionately thick trunk for their height, and few branches. In contrast, trees with thin twigs such as Oak (Quercus), Maple (Acer) and Eucalyptus are called leptocauls while those with moderately thick twigs like Plumeria are called mesocauls. Pachycauly can be the product of exceptional primary growth (as with palms and cycads) or disproportionate secondary growth as with the Baobabs (Adansonia). The word is derived from the Greek pachy- meaning thick or stout, and Latin caulis meaning the stem.

 

ovate

 

ovate

Shaped like a section through the "long axis" of an egg and attached by the wider end.

 

souer

 souer

(a) One who scatters seed on the ground for growth; also fig.; (b) one who causes strife; also, a creator; ~ of discorde(s; ~ of wordes, a babbler

slanhood

 

slanhood n

(fandom slang, dated) The state of being a science fiction fan.

empanoply

 empanoply v

1. (transitive, Britain, military, historical, also figuratively) To dress in a full suit of armour; to panoply.

hunger stone

 hunger stone n

1. A stone, either naturally exposed or intentionally embedded in a river during a drought, which is dated and often inscribed to mark the water level as a warning to future generations that they may face famine if the water reaches that low level again. Such stones are common in Central Europe.

hearken

 hearken v

Duration: 2 seconds.0:02

1. (transitive, archaic except poetic) To hear (something) with attention; to have regard to (something).
2. (intransitive) To listen; to attend or give heed to what is uttered; to hear with attention, compliance, or obedience.
3. (intransitive, obsolete) To enquire; to seek information.

contumely

 

contumely (countable and uncountable, plural contumelies)

Offensive and abusive language or behaviour; scorn, insult.

Great Lakes dialect

 Inland Northern (American) English, also known in American linguistics as the Inland North or Great Lakes dialect, is an American English dialect spoken primarily by White Americans in a geographic band reaching from the major urban areas of Upstate New York westward along the Erie Canal and through much of the U.S. Great Lakes region. The most distinctive Inland Northern accents are spoken in Chicago, Milwaukee, Detroit, Cleveland, Buffalo, Rochester, and Syracuse.

 

Rumex

 The docks and sorrels, genus Rumex, are a genus of about 200 species of annual, biennial, and perennial herbs in the buckwheat family, Polygonaceae. 

 

Yu-Mex

 Yu-Mex (portmanteau of "Yugoslav" and "Mexican") was a style of popular music in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia which incorporated the elements of traditional Mexican music (such as mariachi and ranchera).

scrutable

 

scrutable (comparative more scrutable, superlative most scrutable)

1. (informal) understandable, comprehensible

 

malcified

• 
  

enthralled by malice

Through his dark work he has become malcified

bombilation

 

bombilation (countable and uncountable, plural bombilations)

1. A humming or booming sound.

sward

 

sward (countable and uncountable, plural swards)

1. (uncountable) Earth which grass has grown into the upper layer of; greensward, sod, turf; (countable) a portion of such earth.
1. 
   
2. (countable) An expanse of land covered in grass; a lawn or meadow.

3. Synonym: field

4. (countable, obsolete) The upper layer of the ground, especially when vegetation is growing on it.
5. 
   
6. (countable, obsolete except Britain, dialectal) The rind of bacon or pork; also, the outer covering or skin of something.

Havishamesque

 

Havishamesque (comparative more Havishamesque, superlative most Havishamesque)

Stuck in the past; also, refusing to accept change or failure. 

 An illustration of Miss Havisham by Harry Furniss from a 1910 edition of Charles Dickens’s Great Expectations (originally published 1860–1861).

dodeca

 

dodeca-

1. twelve

gloomies

 

gloomies pl (plural only)

1. (informal) Preceded by the: gloom, despondency.

heart of grace

 

heart of grace (uncountable)

1. (archaic) Chiefly preceded by get, give, take, etc.: courage or relief, especially when gained as a result of favour shown to one.

petro-masculinity

 

“The concept of petro-masculinity suggests that fossil fuels mean more than profit; fossil fuels also contribute to making identities, which poses risks for post-carbon energy politics.” 

 

Nerd sniping

 Nerd sniping is a slang term for the action of giving an interesting problem to a person (usually a nerd), thereby consuming all their attention until the problem is solved. It was coined by xkcd author Randall Munroe in the 356th comic of the series on 12 December 2007.

Festschrift

 In academia, a Festschrift (German pronunciation: [ˈfɛst.ʃʁɪft]; plural, Festschriften [ˈfɛst.ʃʁɪftn̩]) is a book honoring a respected person, especially an academic, and presented during their lifetime. It generally takes the form of an edited volume, containing contributions from the honoree's colleagues, former pupils, and friends. Festschriften are often titled something like Essays in Honour of... or Essays Presented to...

dissolute

 

dissolute (comparative more dissolute, superlative most dissolute)

1. Unrestrained by morality.
2. Recklessly abandoned to sensual pleasures.

webcast

 

webcast (plural webcasts)

1. A video and/or audio broadcast transmitted via the Internet

Twin studies

 Twin studies are studies conducted on identical or fraternal twins. They aim to reveal the importance of environmental and genetic influences for traits, phenotypes, and disorders. Twin research is considered a key tool in behavioral genetics and in related fields, from biology to psychology. Twin studies are part of the broader methodology used in behavior genetics, which uses all data that are genetically informative

Push starting

 Push starting, also known as bump starting, roll starting, clutch starting, popping the clutch or crash starting, is a method of starting a motor vehicle with an internal combustion engine that has a manual transmission, a mechanical fuel pump, and a mechanically driven generator or alternator.

Silverpoint

 Silverpoint (one of several types of metalpoint) is a traditional drawing technique first used by medieval scribes on manuscripts. 

 

Apotheosis

 Apotheosis (from Ancient Greek ἀποθέωσις (apothéōsis), from ἀποθεόω/ἀποθεῶ (apotheóō/apotheô) 'to deify'), also called divinization or deification (from Latin deificatio 'making divine'), is the glorification of a subject to divine levels and, commonly, the treatment of a human being, any other living thing, or an abstract idea in the likeness of a deity. 

 

heroön

 A heroön or heroon (plural heroa) (/hɪˈroʊ.ɒn/; Ancient Greek: ἡρῷον, romanized: hērôion, pl. ἡρῷα, hērôia), also latinized as heroum, is a shrine dedicated to an ancient Greek or Roman hero and used for the commemoration or cult worship of the hero.

 

Grave goods

 

Grave goods, in archaeology and anthropology, are items buried along with a body.

Hell money

 Hell money (Chinese: 冥鈔; pinyin: míngchāo) is a modernized form of joss paper printed to resemble legal tender bank notes. The notes are not an official form of recognized currency or legal tender as their sole intended purpose is to be offered as burnt offerings to the deceased as a solution to resolve their assumed monetary problems in the afterlife.

 

Jesa

Jesa (Korean: 제사, Korean pronunciation: [tɕe.sa]) is a ceremony commonly practiced in China and Korea. Jesa functions as a memorial to the ancestors of the participants.

Joss paper

 Joss paper, also known as incense papers, are papercrafts or sheets of paper made into burnt offerings common in Chinese ancestral worship (such as the veneration of the deceased family members and relatives on holidays and special occasions).

pratincoles

 The pratincoles or greywaders are a group of birds which together with the coursers make up the family Glareolidae. They have short legs, very long pointed wings and long forked tails. 

 

Lojban

 Lojban (pronounced [ˈloʒban] ^ⓘ) is a logical, constructed, human language created by the Logical Language Group which aims to be syntactically unambiguous. It succeeds the Loglan project.

Comptometer

 The Comptometer was the first commercially successful key-driven mechanical calculator, patented in the United States by Dorr Felt in 1887. 

 

composite bow

 A composite bow is a traditional bow made from horn, wood, and sinew laminated together, a form of laminated bow. The horn is on the belly, facing the archer, and sinew on the outer side of a wooden core. When the bow is drawn, the sinew (stretched on the outside) and horn (compressed on the inside) store more energy than wood for the same length of bow.

 

Compsognathidae

 Compsognathidae is a family of coelurosaurian theropod dinosaurs. Compsognathids were small carnivores, generally conservative in form, hailing from the Jurassic and Cretaceous Periods.

 

Comps

 Comps are complimentary items and services given out by casinos to encourage players to gamble. The amount and quality of comps that a player is given usually depends on what games they play, how much they bet, and how long they play.

Composition B

 Composition B (Comp B), also known as Hexotol and Hexolite (among others), is a high explosive consisting of castable mixtures of RDX and TNT.

comfort object

 A comfort object, more formally a transitional object or attachment object, is an item used to provide psychological comfort, especially in unusual or unique situations, or at bedtime for children. Among toddlers, a comfort object often takes the form of a blanket (called a security blanket) or a stuffed animal, doll or other toy, and may be referred to by a nickname such as blankie. 

 

Irish

 Irish (Standard Irish: Gaeilge), or Gaelic (/ˈɡeɪlɪk/ GAY-lik), also sometimes known outside Ireland as Irish Gaelic, is a Goidelic language of the Insular Celtic branch of the Celtic language family, which is a part of the Indo-European language family.

 

Komkor

 Komkor (Russian: комкор) is the abbreviation for corps commander (Russian: командир корпуса, romanized: komandir korpusa; lit. 'commander of the corps / corps commander'), and was a military rank in the Soviet Armed Forces of the USSR in the period from 1935 to 1940. It was also the designation for officers appointed to command a corps sized formation.

Communications Zone

 

Communications Zone is a US Army and NATO term which describes a part of the theater of war operations.

The Communications Zone is the rear part of theater of operations (behind but contiguous to the combat zone) which contains the lines of communications, establishments for supply and evacuation, and other agencies required for the immediate support and maintenance of the field forces.

Concubinage

 Concubinage is an interpersonal and sexual relationship between a person and a person in which the couple does not want or cannot enter into a full marriage.

coevolution

 

In biology, coevolution occurs when two or more species reciprocally affect each other's evolution through the process of natural selection. The term sometimes is used for two traits in the same species affecting each other's evolution, as well as gene-culture coevolution.

Coywolf

 Coywolf is an informal term for a canid hybrid descended from coyotes, eastern wolves, gray wolves, and dogs. All members of the genus Canis are closely genetically related with 78 chromosomes and therefore can interbreed.

 

Alexithymia

 Alexithymia (/əˌlɛksɪˈθaɪmiə/ ə-LEK-sih-THY-mee-ə), also called emotional blindness, is a neuropsychological phenomenon characterized by significant challenges in recognizing, expressing, and describing one's own emotions.

Geohashing

 Geohashing /ˈdʒiːoʊˌhæʃɪŋ/ is an outdoor recreational activity inspired by the webcomic xkcd, in which participants have to reach a random location (chosen by a computer algorithm), prove their achievement by taking a picture of a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver or another mobile device and then tell the story of their trip online. Proof based on non-electronic navigation is also acceptable.

Letterboxing

 Letterboxing is an outdoor hobby that combines elements of orienteering, art, and puzzle solving. Letterboxers hide small, weatherproof boxes in publicly accessible places (like parks) and distribute clues to finding the box in printed catalogs, on one of several web sites, or by word of mouth. Individual letterboxes contain a notebook and a rubber stamp, preferably hand carved or custom made.

рuzzlehunt

 A puzzle hunt (sometimes рuzzlehunt) is an event where teams compete to solve a series of puzzles, many of which are tied together via metapuzzles. Puzzlehunt puzzles are usually not accompanied by direct instructions for how to solve them; figuring out the necessary approach is part of the puzzle. These hunts may be hosted at a particular location, in multiple locations, or via the internet.

propfan

 A propfan, also called an open rotor engine, or unducted fan (as opposed to a ducted fan), is a type of aircraft engine related in concept to both the turboprop and turbofan, but distinct from both.

 

Indigeneity

 Indigeneity is the quality of a person’s and a group’s identity that links them to specific places with knowledge of and respect for original ways.

doodle

 A doodle is a drawing made while a person's attention is otherwise occupied. Doodles are simple drawings that can have concrete representational meaning or may just be composed of random and abstract lines or shapes, generally without ever lifting the drawing device from the paper, in which case it is usually called a scribble.

partisan

 A partisan is a member of an irregular military force formed to oppose control of an area by a foreign power or by an army of occupation by some kind of insurgent activity.

Duce

 Duce (/ˈduːtʃeɪ/ DOO-chay, Italian: [ˈduːtʃe]) is an Italian title, derived from the Latin word dux 'leader', and a cognate of duke. National Fascist Party leader Benito Mussolini was identified by Fascists as Il Duce ('The Leader') of the movement since the birth of the Fasci Italiani di Combattimento in 1919.

caudillo

 A caudillo (/kɔːˈdiː(l)joʊ, kaʊˈ-/ kaw-DEE(L)-yoh, kow-, Spanish: [kawˈðiʎo]; Old Spanish: cabdillo, from Latin capitellum, diminutive of caput "head") is a type of personalist leader wielding military and political power.

Bonapartism

 Bonapartism (French: Bonapartisme) is the political ideology supervening from Napoleon Bonaparte and his followers and successors.

strongman

 A strongman is a type of authoritarian political leader. Political scientists Brian Bell and Dan Slater identify strongman rule as a form of authoritarian rule characterized by autocratic dictatorships depending on military enforcement, as distinct from three other categories of authoritarian rule, specifically machine (oligarchic party dictatorships); bossism (autocratic party dictatorships); and juntas (oligarchic military dictatorships).

Downtempo

 Downtempo (or downbeat) is a broad label for electronic music that features an atmospheric sound and slower beats than would typically be found in dance music. Closely related to ambient music but with greater emphasis on rhythm, the style may be played in chillout clubs or as "warm-up or cool-down" music during a DJ set. Examples of downtempo subgenres include trip hop, ambient house, chillwave, psybient and lo-fi hip hop.

calque

 In linguistics, a calque (/kælk/) or loan translation is a word or phrase borrowed from another language by literal word-for-word or root-for-root translation.

Mind-blindness

 Mind-blindness, mindblindness or mind blindness is a theory initially proposed in 1990 that claims that all autistic people have a lack or developmental delay of theory of mind (ToM), meaning they are unable to attribute mental states to others.

Madchester

 Madchester was a musical and cultural scene that developed in the English city of Manchester in the late 1980s, closely associated with the indie dance scene.

allistic

 

not autistic

Hoosier Hysteria

 Hoosier Hysteria is the state of excitement surrounding basketball in Indiana or, more specifically, the Indiana high school basketball tournament.[

call sign

 In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign (also known as a call name or call letters—and historically as a call signal—or abbreviated as a call) is a unique identifier for a transmitter station. A call sign can be formally assigned by a government agency, informally adopted by individuals or organizations, or even cryptographically encoded to disguise a station's identity. The use of call signs as unique identifiers dates to the landline railroad telegraph system. Because there was only one telegraph line linking all railroad stations, there needed to be a way to address each one when sending a telegram. In order to save time, two-letter identifiers were adopted for this purpose. This pattern continued in radiotelegraph operation; radio companies initially assigned two-letter identifiers to coastal stations and stations on board ships at sea. These were not globally unique, so a one-letter company identifier (for instance, 'M' and two letters as a Marconi station) was later added. By 1912, the need to quickly identify stations operated by multiple companies in multiple nations required an international standard; an ITU prefix would be used to identify a country, and the rest of the call sign an individual station in that country.

 

sardoodledom

 

Noun

sardoodledom (uncountable)

(uncommon) Well-made works of drama that have trivial, insignificant or melodramatic plots. 

Etymology

Named after French dramatist Victorien Sardou + doodle +‎ -dom, coined by Irish playwright, critic, and polemicist (1856–1950) George Bernard Shaw who first used it on the 1 June, 1895 in the Saturday Review when criticising Sardou's well-made plays.