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surfeit: msg#00025

culture.language.word-of-the-day

Subject: surfeit

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The Word of the Day for March 26 is:

surfeit \SUR-fut\ noun
*1 : an overabundant supply : excess
2 : an intemperate or immoderate indulgence in something
(as food or drink)
3 : disgust caused by excess

Example sentence:
A Red Cross spokesperson noted that a surfeit of donated
blood is never really a problem, whereas shortages frequently
are.

Did you know?
There is an abundance -- you could almost say a surfeit --
of English words that derive from the Latin "facere,"
meaning "to do." The connection to "facere" is fairly obvious
for words spelled with "fic," "fac," or "fec," such
as "sacrifice," "benefaction," and "infect." For words
like "stupefy" (a modification of Latin "stupefacere")
and "hacienda" (originally, in Old Spanish and
Latin, "facienda") the "facere" factor is not so apparent. As
for "surfeit," the "c" was dropped along the path that led from
Latin through Anglo-French, where "facere" became "faire"
and "sur-" was added to make "surfaire," meaning "overdo." The
Anglo-French noun "surfet" ("excess") entered Middle English and
went through a number of spellings before settling on "surfeit."


*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.





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