A.Word.A.Day --lubricious

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Oct 6, 2014

This week's theme
Words to describe people

This week's words
lubricious
diffident
virulent
convivial
orgulous

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A.Word.A.Day

with Anu Garg

The novelist and journalist Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr once said, "Every man possesses three characters: that which he exhibits, that which he really has, and that which he believes he has."

This week we'll present five adjectives to describe people. The usage examples ascribe various qualities to the people discussed. Whether these characteristics are what they exhibit, what they really have, or what they believe they have, well, that's up to you to decide.

lubricious

PRONUNCIATION:

(loo-BRISH-uhs)

MEANING:

adjective:
1. Lecherous.
2. Salacious.
3. Shifty or tricky.
4. Smooth and slippery.

ETYMOLOGY:

From Latin lubricus (slippery, smooth). Ultimately from the Indo-European root sleubh- (to slide or slip), which also gave us slip, slop, sloop, sleeve, and lubricate. Earliest documented use: 1584.

USAGE:

"The lubricious, often drooling Claudius himself, I reflect, would have been into full-body massage."
Clive Irving; Ye Olde Dolce Vita; Condé Nast's Traveler (New York); Apr 2011.

"Ella Fitzgerald's rendition of 'Santa Claus Got Stuck in My Chimney' was so lubricious and dripping in double entendres that her record label feared to release it."
Gerry Bowler; Santa Claus: A Biography; McClelland & Stewart; 2005.

See more usage examples of lubricious in Vocabulary.com's dictionary.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

I have always imagined that paradise will be a kind of library. -Jorge Luis Borges, writer (1899-1986)

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