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A.Word.A.Day--gibraltar

Gibraltar (ji-BROL-tuhr) noun

An impregnable stronghold.

Rock of Gibraltar

Something or someone whose strength one can rely on.

[After Gibraltar, a British colony on the southern coast of Spain; home of the Rock of Gibraltar.]

"And it could, at long last, rattle Gibraltar. After all, it's only made of clay." John Carman, Rivals Chip Away At NBC's Gibraltar / Thursday Night Lineup Isn't What it Used to Be, The San Francisco Chronicle, Oct 12, 2000.

"In this Gibraltar of propriety mediocrity gets intrenched, and consolidated, and founded in adamant. An Englishman of fashion is like one of those souvenirs, bound in gold vellum, enriched with delicate engravings, on thick hot-pressed paper, fit for the hands of ladies and princes, but with nothing in it worth reading or remembering." Ralph Waldo Emerson, English Traits, 1856.

This week's theme: toponyms or words derived from place names.

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