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Jul 11, 2018
This week’s theme
Words relating to fruit

This week’s words
apple-polish
fig leaf
grapevine
top banana
plummy

grapevine
Photo: CameliaTWU

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A.Word.A.Day
with Anu Garg

grapevine

PRONUNCIATION:
(GRAYP-vyn)

MEANING:
noun: An informal transmission of information, rumors, gossip, etc., by word of mouth.

ETYMOLOGY:
Shortening of grapevine telegraph, apparently from the spreading of a vine to the spread of a telegraph network and tendrils to wire coils. Earliest documented use: 1867.

USAGE:
“He heard through the grapevine about those who successfully escaped across the channel.”
Jungle Boy by Seif Jamalulail; New Straits Times (Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia); Jun 3, 2018.

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

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
I hold one share in the corporate earth and am uneasy about the management. -E.B. White, writer (11 Jul 1899-1985)

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