WORD FOR THE DAY

What is the name for the person who is the mother of your daughter-in-law? Since I don’t know, I will call her my sister-mother-in-law or perhaps, my sister-mother. Anyway, Ryan’s mom, Rose, made a comment on my site suggesting that I look at yourdictionary.com. This is a cool site that will send you a word for the day and has puzzles using previous words for the day. So if you are interested in improving your vocabulary, this is a great site to explore. Today’s word on yourdictionary.com was lexicon.

My word for the day is –

stentorian (adj.) – very loud; as in “He spoke in a stentorian voice which could be heard in the most distant corners of the hall.”

What’s so interesting about this word is its derivation. Apparently, Stentor was in a shouting competition with Hermes and lost. So why isn’t “very loud,” hermesion? I guess Hermes was already in the lore, so they threw a sop to Stentor. In looking around the word, I found the word, stent, which is a slender thread, rod, or catheter inserted into a tubular structure, such as a blood vessel, to provide support. Same derivation wouldn’t you think? But no, stent is named for Charles R. Stent (1845-1901), an English dentist. Isn’t language interesting?