Skip to content

Table of Contents

The word for today is…

oneiric (adjective):

: of, relating to, or suggestive of dreams : dreamy

Source : Merriam -Webster

Etymology : The notion of using the Greek noun oneiros (meaning “dream”) to form the English adjective oneiric wasn’t dreamed up until the mid-19th century. But back in the late 1500s and early 1600s, linguistic dreamers came up with a few oneiros spin-offs, giving English oneirocriticism, oneirocritical, and oneirocritic (each having to do with dream interpreters or dream interpretation). The surge in oneiros derivatives at that time may have been fueled by the interest then among English-speaking scholars in Oneirocritica, a book about dream interpretation by 2nd-century Greek soothsayer Artemidorus Daldianus. In the 17th century, English speakers also melded Greek oneiros with the combining form ­-mancy (“divination”) to create oneiromancy, meaning “divination by means of dreams.”

If you enjoyed this BFD word of the day please consider sharing it with your friends and, especially, your children.

Latest

Nonce of the Day

Nonce of the Day

The New Zealand Teachers Disciplinary Tribunal has censured Hamilton teacher Grant Daniel Spicer for serious misconduct and ordered that his register entry be annotated for two years.

Members Public
The Good Oil Word of the Day

The Good Oil Word of the Day

The word for today is… increment (noun) - 1: the amount or degree by which something changes, especially : the amount of positive or negative change in the value of one or more of a set of variables 2a: one of a series of regular consecutive additions b: a minute increase

Members Public