July 07, 2012
Word of the Day

BRUIT
audio pronunciation
\BROOT\

DEFINITION

verb
: report, rumor — usually used with about

EXAMPLES

Word of his imminent dismissal was bruited about.

"In Iraq, the mission of the remnant of U.S. forces — the number 3,000 has been bruited — will, [Leon] Panetta says, include counterterrorism actions 'working with the Iraqis.'" — From an editorial by George Will in The Washington Post, September 18, 2011

DID YOU KNOW?

Back in the days of Middle English, the Anglo-French noun "bruit," meaning "clamor" or "noise," rattled into English. Soon English speakers were also using it to mean "report" or "rumor" (it applied especially to favorable reports). We also began using "bruit" as a verb the way we used (and still occasionally do use) the verb "noise," with the meaning "to spread by rumor or report" (as in "the scandal was quickly noised about"). The English noun "bruit" is now considered archaic, but the verb lives on.

July 08, 2012
Word of the Day

SKUPPER
audio pronunciation
\SKUP-er\

DEFINITION

verb

EXAMPLES

The latest information could scupper the peace talks."Greece faces weeks of political turmoil that could scupper its financial bailout after voters angry at crippling income cuts punished mainstream politicians, let a far-right extremist group into Parliament and gave no party enough votes to govern alone." — From an article in Associated Press Online, May 7, 2012

DID YOU KNOW?

All efforts to figure out where this verb came from have been defeated, including attempts to connect it to the noun "scupper," a 500-year-old word for a drain opening in the side of a ship. (One conjecture, that the blood of shipboard battle was "scuppered" when it was washed down the scuppers, unfortunately lacks backing in the form of any actual evidence of the verb used this way.) All we know for sure is that "scupper" meant "to ambush and massacre" in 19th-century military slang. Then, just before the century turned, it found its place in a magazine story in the sense of simply "doing (someone) in." The more common modern application to things rather than people being done in or defeated didn't appear until a couple of decades into the 20th century.