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Square is slang for a person who is conventional and old-fashioned, similar to a fuddy-duddy. [1] [2] [3] This sense of the word "square" originated with the American jazz community in the 1940s in reference to people out of touch with musical trends. [1] Older senses of the term square, referring positively to someone or something honest and upstanding, date back to the 16th century. [3] [4]
The English word square dates to the 13th century and derives from the Old French esquarre . By the 1570s, it was in use in reference to someone or something honest or fair. [3] [4] This positive sense is preserved in phrases such as "fair and square", meaning something done in an honest and straightforward manner, [5] and "square deal", meaning an outcome equitable to all sides. [6] A West Country variant on the phrase, "fairs pears", bears the same meaning and was first traced by Cecil Sharp in 1903 when visiting his friend (and lyrics editor) Charles Marson in Hambridge, South Somerset. [7]
The sense of square as a derogatory reference to someone conventional or old-fashioned dates to the jazz scene of the 1940s; the first known reference is from 1944. There it applied to someone who failed to appreciate the medium of jazz, or more broadly, someone whose tastes were out of date and out of touch. It may derive from the rigid motion of a conductor's hands in a conventional, four-beat rhythm. [3] It is used as both an adjective and a noun. [1] [2] A square contrasted with someone who was hip , or in the know. [1] The cub scout promise included the pledge "to be square" from the 1950s to the 1970s. In contemporary language, U.S. branches of the military refer to "squared away" to describe things that are ordered.
Rhyming slang is a form of slang word construction in the English language. It is especially prevalent among Cockneys in England, and was first used in the early 19th century in the East End of London; hence its alternative name, Cockney rhyming slang. In the US, especially the criminal underworld of the West Coast between 1880 and 1920, rhyming slang has sometimes been known as Australian slang.
A slang is a vocabulary of an informal register, common in verbal conversation but avoided in formal writing. It also sometimes refers to the language generally exclusive to the members of particular in-groups in order to establish group identity, exclude outsiders, or both. The word itself came about in the 18th century and has been defined in multiple ways since its conception.
Pussy is a term used as a noun, an adjective, and—in rare instances—a verb in the English language. It has several meanings, as slang, as euphemism, and as vulgarity. Most commonly, it is used as a noun with the meaning "cat", "coward", or "weakling". In slang usage, it can mean "vulva or vagina" and less commonly, as a form of synecdoche, meaning "sexual intercourse with a woman". Because of its multiple senses including both innocent and vulgar connotations, pussy is often the subject of double entendre.
A jay is a member of a number of species of medium-sized, usually colorful and noisy, passerine birds in the crow family, Corvidae. The evolutionary relationships between the jays and the magpies are rather complex. For example, the Eurasian magpie seems more closely related to the Eurasian jay than to the East Asian blue and green magpies, whereas the blue jay is not closely related to either. The Eurasian jay distributes oak acorns, contributing to the growth of oak woodlands over time.
Marooning is the intentional act of abandoning someone in an uninhabited area, such as a desert island, or more generally to be marooned is to be in a place from which one cannot escape. The word is attested in 1699, and is derived from the term maroon, a word for a fugitive slave, which could be a corruption of Spanish cimarrón, meaning a household animal who has "run wild". Cimarrón in turn may be derived from the Taino word símaran (“wild”), from símara (“arrow”).
A quiz is a form of game or mind sport in which players attempt to answer questions correctly on one or several specific topics. Quizzes can be used as a brief assessment in education and similar fields to measure growth in knowledge, abilities, and skills, or simply as a hobby. They can also be televised for entertainment purposes, often in a game show format.
An officer-elect is a person who has been elected to a position but has not yet been installed. Notably, a president who has been elected but not yet installed would be referred to as a president-elect.
A freak is a person who is physically deformed or transformed due to an extraordinary medical condition or body modification. This definition was first attested with this meaning in the 1880s as a shorter form of the phrase "freak of nature", itself a broader term meaning "whimsy or caprice of nature", attributed at least as far back as 1847. The term's original neutral connotation became entirely negative during the 20th century; therefore, freak with its literal meaning of "abnormally developed individual" is viewed purely as a pejorative today. However, the term is also recently used playfully to refer to an enthusiast or obsessive person.
Flogging a dead horse is an idiom meaning that a particular effort is futile, being a waste of time without a positive outcome, e.g. such as flogging a dead horse, which will not compel it to do useful work.
Cytherean is an adjective literally meaning of Cythera. Cythera is a small Greek island, southeast of the Peloponnesus, and a legendary birthplace of the goddess Aphrodite (Venus). The word Cytherean was first applied to the goddess and later, due to word taboo, to the planet Venus that had been named after the goddess.
Sigillography, also known by its Greek-derived name, sphragistics, is the scholarly discipline that studies the wax, lead, clay, and other seals used to authenticate archival documents. It investigates not only aspects of the artistic design and production of seals, but also considers the legal, administrative and social contexts in which they were used. It has links to diplomatics, heraldry, social history, and the history of art, and is regarded as one of the auxiliary sciences of history. A student of seals is known as a sigillographer.
The duit was an old low-value Dutch copper coin. Struck in the 17th and 18th centuries in the territory of the Dutch Republic, it became an international currency. It had the value of 1/8 stuiver.
Hello is a salutation or greeting in the English language. It is first attested in writing from 1826.
Milord is a term for an Englishman, especially a noble, traveling in Continental Europe. The term was used in both French and English from the 16th century. It derives ultimately from the English phrase "my lord", which was borrowed into Middle French as millourt or milor, meaning a noble or rich man.
Arguendo is a Latin legal term meaning for the sake of argument. "Assuming, arguendo, that ..." and similar phrases are used in courtroom settings, academic legal settings, and occasionally in other domains, to designate provisional and unendorsed assumptions that will be made at the beginning of an argument in order to explore their implications.
A cathedral close is the area immediately around a cathedral, sometimes extending for a hundred metres or more from the main cathedral building. In Europe in the Middle Ages, and often later, it was usually all the property of the cathedral, and under the bishop or cathedral's legal jurisdiction rather than that of the surrounding city. It normally had gates which were locked at night or when there were disturbances in the wider city, hence the name – "close" in the sense of "something enclosed". It usually included buildings housing diocesan offices, schools, free-standing chapels associated with the cathedral, and the palace of the bishop and other clergy houses associated with the cathedral. Cathedral closes are sometimes – but not necessarily – arranged in a sort of square around a courtyard, as at the close at Salisbury Cathedral, which is the largest in Britain.
TL;DR or tl;dr, short for "too long; didn't read", is internet slang often used to introduce a summary of an online post or news article. It is also used as an informal interjection commenting that a block of text has been ignored due to its length.
A windjammer is a commercial sailing ship with multiple masts that may be square rigged, or fore-and-aft rigged, or a combination of the two. The informal term "windjammer" arose during the transition from the Age of Sail to the Age of Steam during the 19th century. The Oxford English Dictionary records the word "windjamming" from 1886 and "windjammer" with reference to a ship from 1892. The term has evolved to include such a vessel, carrying passengers on overnight cruises in the Caribbean, the U.S. state of Maine and elsewhere.
In English, the planet Mars is named after Mars, the Roman god of war, an association made because of its red color, which suggests blood. The adjectival form of Latin Mars is Martius, from which the English word Martian derives, used as an adjective or for a putative inhabitant of Mars, and Martial, used as an adjective corresponding to Terrestrial for Earth. In Greek, the planet is known as Ἄρης Arēs, with the inflectional stem Ἄρε- Are-. That is because of the Greek equivalent to Mars is Ares. From this come technical terms such as areology, as well as the (rare) adjective Arean and the star name Antares.
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