saturnine

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The Word of the Day for January 22 is:

saturnine   \SAT-er-nyne\   adjective
     1 : born under or influenced astrologically by the planet 
Saturn
     2 a : cold and steady in mood : slow to act or change  
*b : of a gloomy or surly disposition  c : having a sardonic 
aspect 

Example sentence:
     He only knew his mother from photos, which showed her to 
be a saturnine woman with a permanent frown.

Did you know?
     Eeyore is saturnine. The gloomy, cynical character of A. 
A. Milne's gray donkey typifies the personality type the 
ancient Romans ascribed to individuals born when the planet 
Saturn was rising in the heavens. Both the name of the planet 
and today's featured adjective derive from the name of the 
Roman god of agriculture, who was often depicted as a bent old 
man with a stern, sluggish, and sullen nature. The Latin name 
for Saturn was "Saturnus," which is assumed to have yielded the 
word "Saturninus" (meaning "of Saturn") in Medieval Latin; that 
form was adapted to create English "saturnine" in the 15th 
century.