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# Word of The Day
- URL: https://goodoil.news/word-of-the-day-190/
- Published: 2024-07-22T18:15:06.000Z
- Updated: 2024-07-22T18:15:07.000Z
- Author: The Editor
- Tags: General

**Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 22, 2024 is:**

**extenuate** • \\ik-STEN-yuh-wayt\\ • *verb*  

*Extenuate* is a formal word that is most often used to mean “to lessen the strength or effect of something, such as a risk.” In legal use, to extenuate a crime, offense, etc., is to lessen or to try to lessen its seriousness or extent by making partial excuses.

// Developers are trying to *extenuate* the various risks associated with the product.

[See the entry >](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/extenuate?ref=goodoil.news)

**Examples:**  

“[Oedipus](https://www.britannica.com/topic/Oedipus-Greek-mythology?ref=goodoil.news), paragon of problem-solvers, discovers by the end of the play the limits of his own keen intellect. In trying to outrun his fate, he learns that he is part of a design that is larger than his understanding. But it is as a victim of fate that he finds the freedom to assume a courageous responsibility for deeds committed in ignorance. ... Nothing can *extenuate* the horror of acts he spent his adult life trying to avoid.” — Charles McNulty, *The Los Angeles Times*, 12 Sept. 2022

**Did you know?**  

*Extenuate* is most familiar in the phrase “[extenuating circumstances](https://bit.ly/4cDR1gM?ref=goodoil.news),” which refers to situations or facts that provide a partial justification or excuse for something. The word *extenuate* can, however, also be used all on its own. Its most typical use is with the meaning “to lessen the strength or effect of something, such as a risk,” but it also has legal use closely related to the meaning of “extenuating circumstances”; to extenuate a crime, offense, etc., is to lessen or to try to lessen its seriousness or extent by making partial excuses. *Extenuate* didn’t get its start in this semantic territory, however. It was borrowed into English in the 1500s with a now-archaic meaning it took directly from its Latin forebear, *extenuare*: “to make light of; to treat as unimportant.” *Extenuate* is today mostly at home in technical and legal contexts, but it occasionally appears in general writing with what may be a developing meaning: “to prolong, worsen, or exaggerate.” This meaning, which is likely influenced by the words [*extend*](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/extend?ref=goodoil.news) and [*accentuate*](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/accentuate?ref=goodoil.news), is not yet fully established.