What Does That Mean? Trivia Quiz

Answer: patronizingly haughty

There are plenty of people around who think they are superior to others and look down on us lesser beings. When they treat people like this, they are being supercilious. The origin of the word is the Latin word for eyebrow - 'supercilium'.

The raised eyebrow, coupled with a knowing look, betrays what the person is thinking about us.

Answer: destructive

Pernicious means harmful, often in an insidious or gradual way. It can be used in a literal or figurative way - having a direct effect or causing damage by, for example, cutting health services. The name was used for the disease pernicious anaemia, as it was a deadly disease before treatments were available to control it.

As so often, we have Latin to thank for giving us the word as it derives from 'perniciosus', meaning destructive. It made its way into English, via French, by the early fifteenth century, initially meaning wicked or evil when applied to an action.

Answer: a traitor

The use of quisling is a relatively new addition to the English language, dating from the 1930s and taken from the name of a real person. Vidkun Quisling was a Norwegian politician who founded Norway's fascist party, the Nasjonal Samling, in 1933. When Germany invaded Norway in 1940, Quisling was installed as Prime Minister by the invaders, eventually paying for his treachery by being executed in 1945.

His name lives on, though, being used for any traitor and particularly one who, like Quisling, collaborates with the enemy.

Answer: greedy

Rapacious describes someone who covets wealth and is grasping and greedy. It is a pejorative term which implies that the person cares nothing for anything other than acquiring money, giving no thought to damage caused to the world around him or her. This could include anyone unfortunate enough to live in property owned by a rapacious landlord, or to the destruction of the environment for personal gain.

Used in English since the mid seventeenth century, the origin is the Latin word 'rapere', meaning to seize. The word rapid, meaning very fast, has the same root.

Answer: an unpleasant smell

Effluvium describes the noxious emissions from decaying matter. It refers to something invisible - you can certainly smell it, but you can't see where it is coming from. It can be used to describe gases emitted from factories, for example, although the word is not used much in the twenty-first century.

It originated in the 1600s and is derived from the Latin word 'effluvium', for a flowing out. Effluent is used to describe the waste products of sewage plants and has the same root.

Answer: lacking resolve

Dating from the fifteenth century in English, pusillanimous means weak, cowardly and having little in the way of courage. Synonyms include lily-livered, spineless or gutless, so it's not the way most of us would like to be described.

The Latin root is 'pusillis', meaning weak, coupled with 'animus', referring to the human spirit or courage.

Answer: to melt

This word is used primarily in chemistry and describes the gradual process of melting caused by moisture in the air being absorbed by the substance which dissolves. It has been in scientific use since 1756 and has been used figuratively since the middle of the nineteenth century.

The word combines two Latin expressions - 'de', in this case meaning completely, and 'liquescere', meaning to melt. More common words from the same root are liquid and liquefaction.

Answer: resisting authority

If you are difficult to handle and refuse to do as you are told, you can be described as recalcitrant. The literal meaning of the expression is "kicking back", and it originated from horses, who kicked back when riders tried to force them into doing something.

The word origin is Latin, with 'calcitrare', meaning kicking with the heel. The scientific name for the heelbone, the calcaneus, is derived from the same root.

Answer: calculatingly insincere

This word describes a person who pretends to be honest and candid, but is actually being deceitful. It made its way into English in the 1640s.

'Genuous', although not used in English, has the same roots as genuine, meaning real or authentic and originally described someone free born in Roman times, not a slave. Adding 'dis' to the beginning of the word turns it into a negative - someone who is neither real nor authentic.

Answer: subservient

Someone who is obsequious is too eager to please, and is servile to an excessive degree. The word has negative connotations and has come to mean someone who could have an ulterior motive. Dickens created the ultimate obsequious character in Uriah Heep, a character from 'David Copperfield', who turns out to be a conniving thief and blackmailer.

The word derives from Latin - the 'sequ' part turns up in sequence and other words that mean following. It came into English usage in the late sixteenth century and seems always to have had a negative interpretation.