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Mar 23, 2009
This week's themeDouble trouble This week's words diptych snake_eyes portmanteau zwieback dicephalous 
Two Tree Diptych
Art: Christina Goodman
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with Anu GargTwo for the price of one! It's a come-on commonly used by marketeers. But getting two of something isn't always desirable. Consider diplopia or duplicity (literally, doubleness). All of this week's words have some connection with doubling. And if a whole week of double-mania proves too much, keep this term handy -- it's guaranteed to purge all the doubling: hemidemisemiquaver. It manages to fit three halvings into one word. diptych
PRONUNCIATION:
(DIP-tik)
MEANING:
noun:
A work of art on two hinged panels, such as a painting or carving.
ETYMOLOGY:
From Latin diptycha, from Greek diptycha, from di- (two) + ptyche (fold).
NOTES:
Then there is triptych, the word for a set of three hinged panels.
The words triptych and diptych are sometimes extended to refer to movies, books, etc.,
for what usually would be called a trilogy or dilogy/duology.
USAGE:
"It's an installation in which participants interact with a diptych
of two real-time images of themselves."Tom Shields; Electronic Madness; Sunday Herald (Glasgow, Scotland); Jun 28, 2008. See more usage examples of diptych in Vocabulary.com's dictionary. A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society. -J. Krishnamurti, author, speaker, and philosopher (1895-1986)
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