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Jan 5, 2011 This week's theme Words related to trees and plants This week's words dendroid ligneous primrose path sylvan wormwood Photo: David J Glaves Discuss Feedback RSS/XML A.Word.A.Day with Anu Garg primrose path PRONUNCIATION: (PRIM-rohz path) MEANING: noun: 1. An easy life, especially devoted to sensual pleasure. 2. A path of least resistance, especially one that ends in disaster. ETYMOLOGY: From Latin prima rosa (first rose). Earliest documented use: 1604. NOTES: It's not clear why "primrose" was picked for naming this metaphorical path. Perhaps Shakespeare chose the word for alliteration -- the word is first attested in his Hamlet where Ophelia says to her brother Laertes: "Do not, as some ungracious pastors do, Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven, Whilst, like a puff'd and reckless libertine, Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads, And recks not his own rede." [Heeds not his own counsel.] USAGE: "Meanwhile, Katich clung on; the primrose path is not for him. The road is strewn with rocks." Peter Roebuck; Victory in Sight, But Punter's Job Far From Over; The Sydney Morning Herald (Australia); Oct 5, 2010. Explore "primrose path" in the Visual Thesaurus. A THOUGHT FOR TODAY: Nothing is so firmly believed as what is least known. -Michel de Montaigne, essayist (1533-1592)

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