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winsome: msg#00012culture.language.word-of-the-day
***************************************************************** Do you march to the beat of a different drummer? Discover where this term came from in our Dictionary of Allusions. http://www.merriam-webster.com/cgi-bin/book.pl?allusion.htm&6 ***************************************************************** The Word of the Day for March 13 is: winsome \WIN-sum\ adjective *1 : generally pleasing and engaging often because of a childlike charm and innocence 2 : cheerful, lighthearted Example sentence: Andrew's winsome smile and sweet personality endeared the toddler to everyone who tended him in the hospital. Did you know? "Winsome" began as "wynsum" a thousand years ago. It was formed from "wynn," the Old English word for "joy" or "pleasure," and the suffix "-sum," an older form of the "- some" we see today in many adjectives, such as "awesome," "irksome," and "lonesome." "Wynn" later became "win," meaning "pleasure," but we haven't used that noun since the 17th century. We do, however, use another word that has a "pleasing" connection and is related, albeit distantly, to "winsome." "Winning" ("tending to please or delight," as in "a winning smile" or "winning ways"), the present participle of the familiar verb "win," is from Old English "winnan," meaning "to struggle." Both "winnan" and "wynn" are thought to be related to Latin "venus," which means, among other things, "charm." *Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence. |
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