A.Word.A.Day --scoria

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scoria

PRONUNCIATION:

(SKOR-ee-uh)

plural scoriae (SKOR-ee-ee)

MEANING:

noun:
1. In metallurgy, the refuse or slag left from smelting. 2. Porous cinderlike fragments of solidified lava.

ETYMOLOGY:

From Latin scoria, from Greek skoria (dross), from skor (dung). Ultimately from the Indo-European root sker- (excrement) that is also the source of drek and scatology.

USAGE:

"[The hiker] actually said the snow made it a bit easier, because it was a bit softer to walk on than the rocky scoria."
Rescuers Help Injured Man Off Mt Taranaki; Otago Daily Times (New Zealand); Jun 8, 2010.

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

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

A society that presumes a norm of violence and celebrates aggression, whether in the subway, on the football field, or in the conduct of its business, cannot help making celebrities of the people who would destroy it. -Lewis H. Lapham, editor and writer (1935- )

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