Thursday, December 12, 2013

Word of the Day nimiety

Word of the Day

  • nimiety
  • audio pronunciation
  • \nih-MYE-uh-tee\
  • DEFINITION
noun
: excess, redundancy
  • EXAMPLES
Nathan is possessed of a nimiety of get-rich-quick schemes, combined with a paucity of common sense.

"Despite the nimiety of blue lighting and an issue over microphone levels, this was a wonderfully gentle evening of poignant country and folk poetry set to simple melodies that go round and round in your brain." — From a concert review by Jon Bennett in The Bristol Post, March 18, 2013
  • DID YOU KNOW?
There's no scarcity of English words used for too much of a good thing—words like "overkill," "plethora," "superfluity," "surfeit," "surplus," and "preponderance." In fact, you might just feel that "nimiety" itself is a bit superfluous. It's true that we've never used the word excessively, though it has been part of our language for nearly 450 years. (We borrowed it from Late Latin "nimietas," a noun taken, in turn, from the Latin adjective "nimius," meaning "excessive.") But though "nimiety" is far from overused, it does turn up occasionally and can be considered a valid addition to any writer or reader's vocabulary.

Read more at http://www.merriam-webster.com/word-of-the-day/#420XiFVOVUj7StiL.99

No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.