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Nov 5, 2021
This week’s theme
There’s a word for it

This week’s words
charientism
oracy
haecceity
balter
caducous

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A.Word.A.Day
with Anu Garg

caducous

PRONUNCIATION:
(kuh-DOO/DYOO-kuhs)

MEANING:
adjective: Tending to fall easily or before the usual time.

ETYMOLOGY:
From Latin caducus (falling), from cadere (to fall). Ultimately from the Indo-European root kad- (to fall), which is also the source of cadence, cascade, casualty, cadaver, chance, chute, accident, occident, decay, deciduous, recidivism, perchance, escheat, and casuistry. Earliest documented use: 1684.

USAGE:
“It was a morning after storm ... the dishevelled lawn littered with a caducous fall of leaves.”
John Banville; The Sea; Knopf; 2007.

“Caducous ideas could set back any efforts to achieve unity.”
Carmen Madera; Enkindled: The Wild Scent of Desire; Xlibris; 2014.

See more usage examples of caducous in Vocabulary.com’s dictionary.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
Do you wish the world were happy? / Then remember day by day, / Just to scatter seeds of kindness / As you pass along the way. -Ella Wheeler Wilcox, poet (5 Nov 1850-1919)

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