每日一词：exiguous（转自 韦氏词典）
Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Day for May 18, 2020 is:
exiguous • \ig-ZIG-yuh-wus\ • adjective
: excessively scanty : inadequate
Examples:
New computer equipment would be prohibitively expensive, given the rural school’s exiguous resources.
“[Adam] Smith’s death was the subject of rather little interest, in England and even in Scotland. The published obituaries were exiguous….” — Emma Rothschild, Economic Sentiments, 2001
Did you know?
Exiguous is so expansive sounding that you might expect it to mean “extensive” instead of “meager.” Even a scanty glimpse at the word’s etymology will disabuse you of that notion, however. Exiguous derives from the Latin exiguus, which has the same basic meaning as the modern English term. Exiguus, in turn, derives from the Latin verb exigere, which is variously translated as “to demand,” “to drive out,” or “to weigh or measure.” The idea of weighing or measuring so precisely as to be parsimonious or petty gave exiguous its present sense of inadequacy. Just so we aren’t accused of being skimpy with the details, we should also mention that exigere is the parent term underlying other English words including exact and exigent.
Lake桑
May 18, 2020 at 01:00PM
评论
发表评论