Skip to content

The word for today is…

abstruse (adjective):

: difficult to comprehend : recondite

Source : Merriam -Webster

Etymology : Look closely at the following Latin verbs, all of which are derived from the verb trudere ("to push, thrust"): extrudere, intrudere, obtrudere, protrudere. Remove the last two letters of each of these and you get an English descendant whose meaning involves pushing or thrusting. Another trudere offspring, abstrudere, meaning "to push away" or "to conceal," gave English abstrude, meaning "to thrust away," but that 17th-century borrowing has fallen out of use. An abstrudere descendant that has survived is abstruse, an adjective that recalls the meaning of its Latin parent abstrūsus, meaning "concealed."

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

Latest

Good Oil Backchat

Good Oil Backchat

Please read our rules before you start commenting on The Good Oil to avoid a temporary or permanent ban.

Members Public
The Sin-Eaters’ Morbid Menu

The Sin-Eaters’ Morbid Menu

We no longer hire miserable wretches to sit by our corpses and eat our misdeeds. Instead, we have public relations firms, crisis management consultants, and political spin doctors who will gladly swallow our worst behaviour and tell the world it tastes like heaven.

Members Public