A.Word.A.Day		About Us | What's New | Search | Site Map | Contact Us

Home Today's Word Yesterday's Word Archives FAQ

Oct 12, 2012 This week's theme Miscellaneous words This week's words inveigh apostle mense bunbury feint This week's comments AWADmail 537 Next week's theme Optimists and pessimists from fiction who became words Read it today Discuss Feedback RSS/XML A.Word.A.Day with Anu Garg feint PRONUNCIATION: (faynt) MEANING: noun: A deceptive move, especially in fencing or boxing. verb: To make a deceptive movement. ETYMOLOGY: From Old French feinte, past participle of feindre (to feign), from Latin fingere (to shape). Ultimately from the Indo-European root dheigh- (to build or form), which also gave us fiction, effigy, paradise, dough, dairy, and lady (literally, a loaf kneader). Earliest documented use: around 1330. USAGE: "Journalists could argue they use appellations as a sign of respect, but I think it's a feint -- a touch of obsequiousness before sticking in the shiv." Emily Yoffe; You Are Not the Speaker; Slate (New York); Mar 20, 2012. Explore "feint" in the Visual Thesaurus. A THOUGHT FOR TODAY: What is the use of a house if you haven't got a tolerable planet to put it on? -Henry David Thoreau, naturalist and author (1817-1862)

A.Word.A.Day by email: Subscribe "The most welcomed, most enduring piece of daily mass e-mail in cyberspace." Sponsored by: Give the Gift of Words Share the magic of words. Send a gift subscription of A.Word.A.Day. Anu on Words: Writer Magazine Globe & Mail Interact: Bulletin board Wordsmith Talk Moderated Chat Wordsmith Chat Readers' Voice AWADmail