This week's theme
Adverbs

This week's words
mayhap
a fortiori
verily
perchance
lief

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Read it today

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A.Word.A.Day

PRONUNCIATION:

(puhr-CHANS)

MEANING:

adverb: Perhaps; maybe.

ETYMOLOGY:

From Old French par cheance (by chance), from Latin per (by, through) + cadentia (fall), from cadere (to fall). Ultimately from the Indo-European root kad- (to fall), which is also the source of cadence, cascade, casualty, cadaver, chance, chute, accident, occident, decay, recidivism, and casuistry. Earliest documented use: 1350.

USAGE:

"New eyes can see things in Worcester that, perchance and mayhap, a few of us who live right here don't -- such as a potentially luminous future."
Nancy Sheehan; Artist Likes What He Sees in Worcester; Telegram & Gazette (Worcester, Massachusetts); Mar 19, 2009.

See more usage examples of perchance in Vocabulary.com's dictionary.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY: