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Jul 9, 2025
This week’s theme
Words related to colors

This week’s words
fulvous
festucine
spadiceous
spadiceous
A white anthurium with spadices in the center
Photo: Ramesh NG
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A.Word.A.Day
with Anu Garg

spadiceous

PRONUNCIATION:
(spay/spuh-DISH-uhs)

MEANING:
adjective:
1. Of a reddish-brown color.
2. Relating to a spadix, the floral spike usually enclosed in a spathe.

ETYMOLOGY:
From Latin spadix (a torn-off palm branch and its fruit), from Greek spadix (a torn-off frond). Earliest documented use: 1646.

USAGE:
“Home, we find one of our own mentionable birds ... weaving inflatable migrating spadiceous chiffons.”
Morgan Benson; The Mating Rituals of the Burning Giraffe; Xlibris; 2010.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
As a child I was taught that to tell the truth was often painful. As an adult I have learned that not to tell the truth is more painful, and that the fear of telling the truth -- whatever the truth may be -- that fear is the most painful sensation of a moral life. -June Jordan, writer, teacher, and activist (9 Jul 1936-2002)

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