Agathokakological: Made up of Both Good and Evil
Alright, I admit it. I had no post idea for today so I came up with this lame one instead. I like words. I am always trying to understand the history of a word. Where did it come from, who used it first, its original purpose, etc. When I was a kid my brother and I played a game to see who could come up with the largest and most obscure word, I usually won. This one is a mouthful isn’t it. It comes from the Greek words agathos, meaning good and kakos, meaning bad but I can’t find the history of it. So all you teachers out there help me out. There must be more than just the definition and the origin. Also what is your favorite ridiculously long word.
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Hmmm….google has quite a list of definitions. What else are you looking for?
It may be interesting to note that it’s a nonce word, in which case you wouldn’t be likely to find the etymology, or any history of usage. Once it enters the general lexicon, it would be catalogued and entered into media, in which case you’d be able to trace it. It seems it just hasn’t caught on (not surprisingly!!).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonce_word
Hope that helps!
whew! right over my head……nonce? lol
My favorite: Schadenfreude!
You’re so cool. I wanted to learn Latin so that I knew where more words came from.
This is NOT a lame post! I love words, too. Especially ones that are difficult to pronounce so that my daughter thinks I’m making it up and then she goes and looks it up and finds out I’m not. If you do this enough times then you really CAN make up new words and mess with their minds. (I’m sneaky that way.)
I tripped over my tongue trying to pronounce it, and sounded like one of Peanut’s word attempts.
Lol! I love the origin of things too.