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stolid: msg#00023

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Subject: stolid

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The Word of the Day for August 24 is:

stolid \STAH-lid\ adjective
: having or expressing little or no sensibility :
unemotional

Example sentence:
The judge was a man of stolid temperament who did not let
the impassioned rhetoric of litigants affect his decisions.

Did you know?
"Stolid" derives from "stolidus," a word that means "dull"
or "stupid" in Latin. It is also distantly related to the
word "stultify," meaning "to cause to appear or be stupid,
foolish, or absurdly illogical." The earliest examples of usage
for "stolid," dating back to the 17th century, indicate that it
too was originally associated with a lack of smarts; it was used
to describe people who were considered dull or stupid because
they didn't wear their emotions on their sleeves. By the 1800s,
however, "stolid" was frequently appearing without the
connotation of foolishness, and it continues to be free of such
overtones today.






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