This week’s theme
Words formed in error

This week’s words
megrim
posthumous
lutestring
messuage
frontispiece



This week’s comments
AWADmail 712

Next week’s theme
Miscellaneous words

---

A.Word.A.Day

PRONUNCIATION:

(FRUN-ti-spees)

MEANING:

noun:
1. An illustration facing or preceding the title page of a book.
2. A facade, especially an ornamental facade, of a building.
3. An ornamental pediment over a door or window.

ETYMOLOGY:

The word was formed by corruption of French frontispice by association with the word ‘piece’. It’s from Latin frontispicium (facade), from front- (front) + specere (to look). Ultimately from the Indo-European root spek- (to observe), which also gave us spy, spice, species, suspect, expect, spectrum, despise, despicable, bishop, telescope, specious, speciesism, soupcon, prospicient, perspicuous, speculum, omphaloskepsis, and conspectus. Earliest documented use: 1598.

USAGE:

“I still have the physical copy, its frontispiece decorated with characters from the stories.”
Francine Prose & Ayana Mathis; Bookends; The New York Times Book Review; Oct 26, 2014.

“An ornate frontispiece above the front door, shutters, and flower boxes add charm to the white painted brick facade.”
Lauren Beale; Eva Gabor’s Onetime Estate in Holmby Hills is for Sale; Los Angeles Times; Oct 22, 2015.

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

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY: