Word of the Day
lunisolar
adjective
pertaining to or based upon the relations or joint action of the moon and the sun.
More about lunisolar
Lunisolar, meaning 鈥減ertaining to or based upon the relations or joint action of the moon and the sun,鈥� is used exclusively in astronomy, as in lunisolar calendar or lunisolar precession. The word comes straight from the Latin nouns 濒奴苍补 鈥渕oon鈥� and 蝉艒濒 鈥渟un鈥� (the –i– is a Latin connecting vowel). It is no accident that 濒奴苍补 looks so much like Russian 濒耻苍谩: They both come from the same Proto-Indo-European noun 濒辞耻办蝉苍腻, from the root leuk-, louk-, luk– 鈥渢o shine, be bright.鈥� 尝辞耻办蝉苍腻 becomes 谤补辞办丑蝉丑苍腻 鈥渟hining, brilliant, radiant鈥� in Avestan (the Old Iranian language of the Zoroastrian scriptures); as a proper name, 搁补辞办丑蝉丑苍腻 is transliterated in Greek as 搁丑艒虫谩苍脓 Roxanne (the English spelling was affected by the name Anne). 搁补辞办丑蝉丑苍腻 was an Iranian princess who become Alexander the Great鈥檚 wife (she bore Alexander a posthumous son). Latin 蝉艒濒 comes from Proto-Indo-European 蝉腻飞别濒 (from 蝉腻飞别濒 to 蝉腻飞辞濒 to 蝉腻辞濒 to 蝉艒濒). The derivative noun 蝉腻飞别濒ios 鈥渟un鈥� becomes 丑岣条颈辞蝉 in (Classical Attic) Greek. Greek dialects have the forms 脓茅濒颈辞蝉 (Homeric), 丑腻虂濒颈辞蝉 and 腻茅濒颈辞蝉 (Doric), and awelios (Cretan). Lunisolar entered English in the second half of the 17th century.
how is lunisolar used?
To correct for seasonal drift, the Chinese, Hindu, Jewish and many other calendars are lunisolar. In these calendars, a month is still defined by the moon, but an extra month is added periodically to stay close to the solar year.
The day of or the day after the New Moon marks the start of the new month for most lunisolar calendars. The first month of the Chinese calendar starts on Friday, February 12, 2021 (at midnight in China’s time zone, which is 13 hours ahead of EST), making this Chinese New Year, the start of the year of the Ox!
lunisolar
galimatias
noun
confused or unintelligible talk.
More about galimatias
Galimatias, 鈥渃onfused or unintelligible talk,鈥� is a masculine singular noun in French. It first appears in 1580 in an essay of Montaigne鈥檚; it first appears in English in 1653 in a translation of Rabelais. Galimatias has no reliable etymology: scholars suggest a connection with gallimaufry 鈥渁 hodgepodge, a jumble,鈥� but these are just guesses.
how is galimatias used?
“I have seen this letter in which you tell me there is so much galimatias, and I assure you that I have not found any at all. On the contrary, I find everything very plainly expressed …”
Such productions are called books, because there is no other name for them. As a matter of fact, idle talk and galimatias of the sort are in no wise literature.
galimatias
More about parlous
Parlous and its variant perlous, meaning 鈥渄angerous,鈥� are contractions of perilous, which dates from the end of the 13th century. Perilous comes from Old French perillus, perilous, perilleus (with many more spelling variants) 鈥渄angerous, hazardous,鈥� from Latin 辫别谤墨肠耻濒艒蝉耻蝉. Parlous and perlous both entered English at about the same time, toward the end of the 14th century.
how is parlous used?
High school lay before me, vast and parlous, as middle school receded in the rearview mirror.
I gave him two one-dollar bills. As I handed them over I noticed that one of them had seen parlous times. Its upper right-hand corner was missing, and it had been torn through in the middle, but joined again.
parlous