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Dec 9, 2015
This week’s theme
Where’s the rest of my word?

This week’s words
jaculate
cognize
plaint
suage
gratulate
The Anagram Times
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A.Word.A.Day
with Anu Garg

plaint

PRONUNCIATION:
(playnt)

MEANING:
noun: 1. Complaint. 2. Protest. 3. Lamentation.

ETYMOLOGY:
From from Old French plainte (complaint, cry), from Latin planctus (lamentation), from plangere (to beat one’s breast). Ultimately from the Indo-European root plak- (to strike), which also gave us plaintiff, plague, plankton, fling, complain, apoplectic and plangent. Earliest documented use: 1225.

USAGE:
“That’s how it works in this era of Internet preening, out-of-control partisanship and press-a-button punditry, when anything and everything becomes prompt for a plaint, a rant, a riff.”
Frank Bruni; The Exploitation of Paris; The New York Times; Nov 14, 2015.

See more usage examples of plaint in Vocabulary.com’s dictionary.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
The mind is its own place, and in itself / Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven. -John Milton (9 Dec 1608-1674)

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Anu Garg on words

“A large vocabulary is like an artist having a big palette of colors. We don’t have to use all the colors in a single painting, but it helps to be able to find just the right shade when we need it.”

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