betwixt

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The Word of the Day for October 10 is: 

betwixt   \bih-TWIKST\   adverb or preposition
     : between 

Example sentence:
          “A relative newbie as satellites go will glide betwixt a crescent 
moon and the Red Planet tonight on its way to the Little Dipper.” (Thomas 
Stauffer, _Arizona Daily Star_, March 2, 2006) 

Did you know?
          “Jack Sprat could eat no fat, his wife could eat no lean; and so 
betwixt the two of them, they licked the platter clean.” Perhaps you've always 
said "and so between the two of them" when reciting the tale of Jack Sprat and 
his wife. That's fine. “Betwixt” and “between” have similar origins: they both 
come from a combination of “be-” and related Old English roots. Both words 
appeared before the 12th century, but use of “betwixt” dropped off considerably 
toward the end of the 1600s. It survived in the phrase "betwixt and between" 
(“neither one thing nor the other”), which took on a life of its own in the 
18th century. Nowadays “betwixt” is uncommon, but it isn’t archaic; it's simply 
used more consciously than "between."





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