This week's theme
Words derived from body parts

This week's words
cordate
amanuensis
impedimenta
spleen
mansuetude

This week's comments
AWADmail 649

Next week's theme
Illustrated words

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A.Word.A.Day

PRONUNCIATION:

(MAN-swi-tood, -tyood)

MEANING:

noun: Gentleness; meekness.

ETYMOLOGY:

From Latin mansuescere (to make tame: to accustom to handling), from manus (hand) + suescere (to become accustomed). Ultimately from the Indo-European root man- (hand), which is also the source of manual, manage, maintain, manicure, maneuver, manufacture, manuscript, command, manque, amanuensis, legerdemain, and mortmain. Earliest documented use: 1390.

USAGE:

"Presently, with the blessing, you will see Padeen's face return to its usual benevolent mansuetude."
Patrick O'Brian; The Letter of Marque; HarperCollins; 1988.

"She had heard me and returned to me and saved me; embraced me, in her might as much as her mansuetude."
Michael Nesmith; The Long, Sandy Hair of Neftoon Zamora; St. Martin's Press; 1998.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY: