While furuncle in Latin stands for thief or knave, pathologically it is synonymous with the term boil, which is too well known to require a definition." Furunculus is diminutive of fur, "thief."Įxample: "The word carbuncle, in Latin means live coal, and in Greek, anthrax signifies the same thing. Evan Thomas, " Senator Hothead," Newsweek, February 20, 2000įuruncle, "a circumscribed inflammation of the skin, forming a necrotic central core, and suppurating and discharging the core a boil," comes from the Latin furunculus, "knob on a vine that 'steals' the sap.
The word ferret has multiple meanings, the earliest of which is "a weasellike, usually albino mammal (Mustela putorius furo) related to the polecat and often trained to hunt rats or rabbits." The word comes from the Vulgar Latinfurittus, diminutive of Latin fur, "thief." Ferret took on a figurative meaning around 1600, according to the OED, "to hunt after to worry," with the earliest recorded usage in Shakespeare's Henry V: " Ile Fer him, and ferit him, and ferke him." Ferret also means "to drive out, as from a hiding place" "to uncover and bring to light by searching" or "to search intensively."Įxample: "McCain employs a staffer known as the 'ferret' to find and expose pork-barrel provisions tucked away in major legislation." " Taking liberties: a jailbreak to San Diego ," The Guardian, April 15, 2011 Tales of My Father, and My Friends, 1823īusk, meaning "to earn a livelihood by going about singing, playing, and selling ballads," may come from another meaning of the word, "to cruise as a pirate." The word itself may come from the obsolete French busquer, "to prowl."Įxample: "We would all have 36 hours to blag, beg and busk our way around the globe." An Adam Tiler is "a pickpocket's accomplice, who takes the stolen goods and leaves with them." According to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the term originated in the 1660s and comes from Adam, "the name of the first man," and tiler, slang for "pickpocket."Įxample: "Why, an autem diver is a pickpocket who practises in a church, and an Adam tiler his associate, who receives his booty, and runs off with it."
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