impervious

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The Word of the Day for February 21 is: 

impervious   \im-PER-vee-us\   adjective
     1 *a : not allowing entrance or passage : impenetrable  b : not
capable of being damaged or harmed
     2 : not capable of being affected or disturbed 

Example sentence:
     "The church's thick stone walls seemed to be impervious to noise...."
(_Pittsburgh Post-Gazette_, August 26, 2001)

Did you know?
     The English language is far from impervious, and, of course, a great
many Latinate terms have entered it throughout its history. "Impervious"
is one of the many that broke through in the 17th century. It comes from
the Latin "impervius," which adds the prefix "im-" to "pervius," meaning
"passable" or "penetrable." "Pervius," which is also the source of the
relatively uncommon English word "pervious," meaning "accessible" or
"permeable," comes from "per-," meaning "through," and "via," meaning
"way."

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence. 





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