A.Word.A.Day --recapitulate

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Aug 25, 2014

This week's theme
Words that can't be analyzed easily

This week's words
recapitulate
degust
reprove
prorogue
repose

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A.Word.A.Day

with Anu Garg

Include is the opposite of exclude, but intend is not the opposite of extend. Delist is the opposite of list, but devote is not the opposite of vote. To redo something is to do it again, but to recapitulate is not to capitulate again.

Dissecting a word into its parts usually helps us figure it out, but at times this rule of thumb points us in the wrong direction.

This week we'll look at other words with meanings that can't always deduced from their looks. We'll discuss such words, but we'll neither dis them, nor cuss them.

recapitulate

PRONUNCIATION:

(ree-kuh-PICH-uh-layt)

MEANING:

verb tr., intr.: To summarize or to repeat.

ETYMOLOGY:

From Latin recapitulare (to sum up), re- (again) + capitulare (to draw up under headings), from capitulum (little head, chapter), from caput (head). Ultimately from the Indo-European root kaput- (head), also the origin of head, captain, chef, chapter, cadet, cattle, chattel, achieve, biceps, mischief, and occiput. Earliest documented use: 1551.

USAGE:

"The discovery of the Higgs particle is an astonishing triumph of mathematics' power to reveal the workings of the universe. It's a story that's been recapitulated in physics numerous times, but each new example thrills just the same."
Brian Greene; Mind Over Matter; Smithsonian (Washington, DC); Jul/Aug 2013.

See more usage examples of recapitulate in Vocabulary.com's dictionary.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

Bullets cannot be recalled. They cannot be uninvented. But they can be taken out of the gun. -Martin Amis, novelist (b. 1949)

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