Preternatural-“Extraordinary” (“a preternatural ability”) or “inexplicable by other means” (a synonym of “psychic”). It comes from the Medieval Latin word praeternaturalis, formed from the Latin words praeter naturam, meaning “beyond nature.” In a sense, preternatural is a fancy way of saying “supernatural.”
Colonel-The French took the word colonnello from Italian—it comes from the word for “column” and referred to the leader of a column of soldiers—but the French altered the spelling to coronel. Such substitutions in different languages are not unknown between liquid consonants. The word came to English from French in the mid-1500s, but by the mid-1600s Recondite-“Difficult or impossible for one of ordinary understanding or knowledge to comprehend” as in “recondite scholarship” or “recondite turn of phrase.” It’s also used to mean “hidden from sight” or “concealed.” It comes from the Latin word reconditus, meaning “to conceal,” and though the alternative pronunciation \rih-KAHN-dyte\ is given in our dictionaries, the pronunciation with first-syllable stress is most common. Waistcoat-Wearing a waistcoat was a marker of class and prestige in the 16th century, and knowing how to say it may also have been a demonstration of a class distinction. Presumably just a hasty shortening of the compound term, \WESS-kut\ is the preferred way to say it Victuals-“Supplies of food” or “provisions,” and comes from the Latin word victualis meaning “of nourishment.” It went through French before it came into English, and the pronunciation was presumably established based on the French spelling vitaille before the spelling was changed to better reflect the Latin root of the word. Vittle is given in our dictionaries as a variant of victuals, but the later learned spelling is the preferred one. Imprimatur-“official approval” today. It comes directly from the Latin word meaning “let it be printed,” and was originally used in English contexts to mean “a license to print or publish,” sometimes indicated by a stamp or imprint on the title page of the book. Since it was originally a bookish word, it stands to reason that the Latinate pronunciation was favored—in Latin, there would be stress on the final two syllables Solder-The silent ‘l’ in solder isn’t completely exotic: other, more common words like salmon, calm, walk, should, and calf also have one. But since solder is encountered less frequently than these (and is perhaps spoken more frequently than it is written), it’s a tricky one. Boatswain-Boatswain and coxswain are both formed using swain, a now archaic word meaning “boy” or “servant.” The first part of each word is from boat and cok, meaning “cockboat,” or a small boat. The variant spelling bosun reflects the pronunciation. Conch-This could go either way, since there are two ways to pronounce ch- in English: the more familiar \CHUH\ sound like ranch, rich, and paunch as well as the hard \k\ sound, as in tech and epoch. Although we give \KAHNCH\ as a variant for conch, \KAHNK\ is the more common pronunciation.Synonyms of Common English Words || You're (Probably) Saying it Wrong
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