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Nov 6, 2019
This week’s theme
Words originating in the hand

This week’s words
glad hand
fingerpost
chirocracy
bareknuckle
manumission



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A.Word.A.Day
with Anu Garg

chirocracy

PRONUNCIATION:
(ky-ROK-ruh-see)

MEANING:
noun: Government that rules by physical force.

ETYMOLOGY:
From Greek chiro- (hand) + -cracy (rule), alluding to a rule by a strong hand or a heavy-handed rule. Earliest documented use: 1677.

USAGE:
“Although he did not explicitly say so, it seems likely that our author regarded contemporary society as going through the stages of ‘dangerous democracy’ and ‘anarchy or chirocracy’; after all, in 1577, the royal government of the Netherlands had collapsed, the States had taken matters into their own hands.”
Tabitta Van Nouhuys; The Ages of Two-Faced Janus; Brill; 1998.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
I don't think that combat has ever been written about truthfully; it has always been described in terms of bravery and cowardice. I won't even accept these words as terms of human reference any more. And anyway, hell, they don't even apply to what, in actual fact, modern warfare has become. -James Jones, novelist (6 Nov 1921-1977)

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