The unfortunate who can properly be described as crapulent is one suffering the effects of imbibing too freely or eating to excess. If such overindulgence is chronic, he can be called crapulous, but, in the confusing ways of our language, that term is also sometimes used as a synonym of crapulent. Crapulent comes from Late Latin crapulentus, based on L. crapula (drunkenness), which was an import from Greece. Crapulous is from LL crapulosus. None of these words has anything to do with the vulgar word that forms the first syllable of each [e.a.] and has an altogether distinct etymology: Middle English crappe, from Dutch krappe (chaff--the husks thrown away in threshing--whence the word came to mean "worthless stuff, refuse"). - Norman W. Schur
-joe d. bunke
This week's theme: words that aren't what they appear to be.
p.s. - I believe one can be crapulent (hung-over) without throwing up!
