riposte

****************************************************************
Gearing up for back-to-school? Be sure to check out our line 
of updated age-specific school references!
http://www.merriam-webster.com/cgi-bin/book.pl?scholref.htm
****************************************************************

The Word of the Day for September 6 is: 

riposte   \ rih-POAST\   noun 
     1 : a fencer's quick return thrust following a parry
    *2 : a retaliatory verbal sally : retort
     3 : a retaliatory maneuver or measure

Example sentence:
     Lyn is a master of verbal riposte, able to dash off the kind of replies 
that most people only think of in the car on the way home.

Did you know?
     In the sport of fencing, a riposte is a counterattack made after 
successfully fending off one's opponent. English speakers borrowed the name for 
this particular maneuver from French in the early 1700s, but the French had 
simply modified Italian "riposta," which literally means "answer." Ultimately 
these words come from the Latin verb "respondere," meaning "to respond." It 
seems fitting that "riposte" has since come full circle to now refer to a quick 
and witty response performed as a form of retaliation in the thrust and parry 
of a verbal contest. 

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.