English III H Vocab

English III H Vocab List

Unit 1:

• Inveigh (verb)

  • speak/write of with hostility

  • He inveighed against the decision to send the Golden Record to space.

• Ennui (noun)

  • Boredom and dissatisfaction

  • He let ennui take over during his study hall because he didn’t have any homework.

• Diffident (adjective)

  • modest/shy because of lacking self-confidence

  • The alien was diffident, worrying it was failing to blend in among the humans.

• Coterie (noun)

  • A small, exclusive group of people with shared interests

  • She formed a coterie of people who appreciated silverware as much as she did. 

• Politic (adjective)

  • Seemingly sensible and judicious

  • I believe that it is politic to free the convict from death row.

• Indefatigable (adjective)

  • Tirelessly persistent

  • The lawyer was indefatigable in his research of the case. 

• Sophistry (noun)

  • A misleading argument made to deceive others

  • He concocted a sophistry to promote his company’s new flavor of juice.

• Litigious (adjective)

  • Unreasonably prone to settle disputes through the legal system

  • The HOA was litigious, threatening to go to court over the smallest infraction. 

• Toady (noun, verb)

  • One who is overly obedient to an important figure, the act of sucking up to someone

  • She was such a toady she became known to be a teacher's pet. 

• Puissant (adjective)

  • Powerful or influential

  • The most puissant country in the world is the United States, according to many US citizens.

• Bilious (adjective)

  • Affected by nausea OR spiteful and ill-tempered

  • The undercooked salmon left her bilious. 

• Bandy (adjective, verb, noun)

  • Bow-legged OR to discuss in a casual/uninformed manner OR a hockey-like sport

  • The bandy boy bandied about the game of bandy he had played. 

• Risible (adjective)

  • Laughable

  • The poor CGI was risible at best. 

• Voluble (adjective)

  • Able to speaking fluently

  • The foreign exchange student was surprisingly voluble in English. 

• Sepulchral (adjective)

  • Relating to entombment

  • Juliet had sepulchral fears for her life, but ultimately decided to take the potion.

• Soporific (adjective)

  • Sleep-inducing

  • The soporific medicine put the patient to sleep within seconds. 

• Desultory (adjective)

  • Without reason or enthusiasm

  • The lecture began to bore the students, as the professor spoke in a desultory manner. 

• Restive (adjective)

  • Difficult to control due to impatience, dissatisfaction, boredom, etc.

  • After hearing the outrageous plan, the politician was restive. 

• Florid (adjective)

  • Having a flushed complexion OR excessively intricate

  • The grandmaster’s face was florid after failing to see the florid chain of moves that led to his defeat. 

• Umbrage (noun)

  • Offense or annoyance OR a shadow cast by trees

  • After returning from his long journey, the man felt great umbrage from the umbrage cast by the trees onto his house, blocking the natural light. 

Unit 2:

• Cacophony (noun)

  • Many discordant noises sounding together at once

  • After Mr. Jones fired a bullet from his shotgun, the farm animals scattered in a cacophony of squawks, moos, oinks, and whinnies.

• Remonstrate (verb)

  • To protest forcefully

  • The boy’s mother remonstrated him, saying, “You will eat your broccoli and you will like it.”

• Caveat (noun)

  • A condition or stipulation

  • The genie promised to grant him three wishes, with the caveat that they may not turn out the way he wanted. 

• Dun (adjective, noun, verb)

  • Dull and grayish brown OR a dull and grayish brown color OR a grayish brown horse with a black mane, tail, lower legs, and a dark dorsal stripe OR a sub-adult mayfly OR to persistently demand something OR a debt collector OR a Scottish or Irish stone-built, fortified settlement

  • In a dun dun, a dun flew into the eye of a dun, and, as all it could see was dun, it ran over a dun, who dunned to be paid for his injuries. 

• Charlatan (noun)

  • A person who makes fraudulent claims to be able to do something they cannot

  • The charlatan made one hundred dollars by telling people fake fortunes. 

• Torpid (adjective)

  • Mentally and/or physically inactive

  • After a hard day at the construction site, the construction worker lay down on his recliner, turned on the television, and remained torpid for the rest of the day.

• Vilify (verb)

  • To speak or write about very harshly

  • The politicians vilified each other so much during their campaign that, to their surprise, a third party candidate won the election. 

• Sublime (adjective, verb)

  • Exceedingly pleasant OR to change directly from a solid to gaseous state of matter OR to be elevated to spiritual perfection

  • The chemistry teacher thought that the sublimation went so sublimely that the chemistry gods would sublime his soul.

• Prolixity (noun)

  • The use of so many unnecessary words that it becomes boring or difficult to follow

  • This sentence, which is a set of words that is complete in itself, typically containing a subject and predicate, conveying a statement, question, exclamation, or command, and consisting of a main clause and sometimes one or more subordinate clauses, is an example, or a a thing characteristic of its kind or illustrating a general rule, of the word (a single distinct meaningful element of speech or writing, used with others (or sometimes alone) to form a sentence and typically shown with a space on either side when written or printed) prolixity. 

• Supernal (adjective)

  • Relating to the sky or the heavens

  • The stones in the crown were supernal, made up of colors ranging from the deepest blues to the lightest aquamarines. 

• Loquacity (noun)

  • The quality of talking a lot

  • The teacher’s lack of loquacity made her class every student’s favorite. 

• Sidereal (adjective)

  • Relating to distant stars

  • After spending a week stuck in the system of caves, the sidereal view felt like the most beautiful thing they had ever seen.

• Plaudits (noun)

  • An expression of praise or commendation

  • The governor received both plaudits and criticisms for his decision to open a large supermarket in the middle of the town. 

• Importune (verb, adjective)

  • To persistently pester someone about something or to do something OR troublesome

  • He importuned everyone to try banana flavored ice cream whenever the opportunity presented its importune self. 

• Reprove (verb)

  • To criticize someone

  • The muckrakers reproved the immoral companies in their journals. 

• Fastidious (adjective)

  • Attentive to detail

  • Eye am’nt beeing vary fastidious inn the righting of this sentence. 

• Supine (adjective, noun)

  • Lying flat on one’s back OR failing to act against wrongdoing due to moral weakness OR a single distinct meaningful element of speech or writing, used with others (or sometimes alone) to form a sentence and typically shown with a space on either side when written or printed

  • While lying supine on his bed, Charlie thought his class was supine for not making their Latin teacher teach them the supine. 

• Gormandize (verb)

  • To eat an excessive amount of good food

  • The chef gormandized on the leftover Thanksgiving dinner. 

• Nadir (noun)

  • The lowest point of fortune

  • After failing three classes, she had reached the nadir of her academic career. 

• Captious (adjective)

  • Tending to object over unimportant things

  • The captious captain complained that his cocaptain was a capricorn.

Unit 3:

• Prodigious (adjective)

  • To a great degree OR abnormal

  • A prodigious amount of people were acting prodigious as they all ate their soup with a fork.

• Artifice (noun)

  • Clever or cunning tricks

  • The experienced interviewer saw through the artifice of the interviewee’s casual manner.

• Debunk (verb)

  • Expose as fake

  • The conspiracy about the moon landing being fake was finally debunked. 

• Intuit (verb)

  • To understand instinctively

  • I intuited that the butler had been the murderer. 

• Vestigial (adjective)

  • A remnant of something that used to be more substantial

  • The vestigial remains of the castle failed to capture its former glory. 

• Parsimony (noun)

  • An unwillingness to spend money or resources

  • After he finished the game, he realized that his parsimony had led him to have more money than he could spend. 

• Plinth (noun)

  • A heavy base supporting a statue or vase

  • The plinth holding the statue was poorly made, and collapsed, causing the statue to fall with it. 

• Simian (noun, adjective)

  • An ape or monkey OR ape-like

  • There is no doubt that the simian figure was, in fact, a real monkey. 

• Effusive (adjective)

  • Expressing gratitude or pleasure without restraint OR the quality of an igneous rock having been poured out when molten and later solidified

  • The petrologist was effusive when her mentor showed her the rare effusive rock. 

• Avuncular (adjective)

  • Relating to an uncle OR a benevolent relationship

  • Tom’s brother and son had a close avuncular relationship. 

• Probity (noun)

  • The quality of having strong morals, honesty, and decency

  • The probity of the employee made climbing the corporate ladder difficult. 

• Draconian (adjective)

  • Unnecessarily harsh

  • The punishment of taking away his iPad seemed draconian to the little boy. 

• Hoi polloi (noun)

  • The people (derogatory)

  • Looking down at the hoi polloi from his balcony, the emperor felt great disgust. 

• Maelstrom (noun)

  • A powerful whirlpool

  • Theseus’s ship was sucked into the maelstrom; but was it really Theseus’s ship anymore?

• Expunge (adjective)

  • To eliminate

  • If i was up to me, I would expunge the world of mosquitoes

• Nonplussed (adjective, verb, noun)

  • Surprised to the extent of not knowing how to react OR unperturbed OR to surprise and confuse someone OR a state of bewilderment

  • After being nonplussed by the news so many times, he became nonplussed. 

• Doctrinaire (adjective, noun)

  • Seeking to pass a doctrine without regard to practical considerations OR one who seeks to pass a doctrine without regard to practical considerations

  • The doctrinaire was doctriaire, wishing to create a religious prohibition of hamburgers on Fridays from three to four AM. 

• Halcyon (adjective, noun)

  • Denoting a period of time that was happy and peaceful OR a tropical Asian and African kingfisher with brightly colored plumage OR a mythical bird said by ancient writers to breed in a nest floating at sea at the winter solstice, charming the wind and waves into calm

  • In the halcyon days of yore, people confused the halcyon kingfisher for a mythical halcyon bird. 

• Antediluvian (adjective)

  • Pertaining to the period before the biblical flood OR old

  • Noah, why did you have to make the dinosaurs antediluvian?

• Prevaricate (verb)

  • To speak or act evasively

  • When the police started to tail him, the escaped criminal began to prevaricate.

Unit 4:

• Otiosity (noun)

  • Uselessness or indolence

  • The otiosity of trying to make gold out of lead left the alchemist questioning his career choice

• Aggrandize (verb)

  • To increase the status or scope of something

  • The money from the benefactor aggrandized Pip’s station. 

• Indubitable (adjective)

  • Impossible to doubt

  • After seeing the knight slay a dragon, the town found became aware of his indubitable strength. 

• Refulgent (adjective)

  • Shining brightly

  • The last thing anyone saw before the fusion reactor melted down was a refulgent burst of light. 

• Profundity (noun)

  • Of great depth of thought and wisdom

  • The profundity of the ancient philosophies was incomprehensible to most men. 

• Comely (adjective)

  • Pleasant to look at

  • I could not look away from the comely blue flames produced by adding Copper II Chloride to the fire. 

• Lassitude (noun)

  • A lack of energy, physically or mentally

  • The lassitude in the office building made Michael immediately regret accepting the internship. 

• Discursive (adjective)

  • Unfocused; switching from idea to idea OR relating to communication/argument OR proceeding based on reasoning instead of intuition

  • The alibi was too discursive to sound believable. 

• Axiomatic (adjective)

  • Self-evident and undeniable

  • The issue of climate change has become axiomatic.

• Verbose (adjective)

  • Described in more words than are needed

  • I personally find an undeniable excellence in the process of communicating in an unnecessarily verbose manner, for it can lead any kind of person to sound more intelligent than that aforementioned person is in sooth. 

• Surreptitious (adjective)

  • Kept secret to avoid disapproval

  • Romeo and Juliet kept their love surreptitious from their families.

• Remunerate (verb)

  • To pay someone for their services

  • The plumber was remunerated for his work, but was called back a week later for another leak. 

• Indolence (noun)

  • Avoidance of activity; laziness

  • Your indolence will keep you from getting into shape. 

• Bastion (noun)

  • A protective part of a fortification sticking out from the wall at an angle OR a person, place or thing defending certain principles

  • The castle was a bastion for bastions everywhere; many builders took inspiration from its architecture

• Supercilious (adjective)

  • Behaving or looking as if one is superior to others

  • The supercilious man was sat by himself drinking champagne, as he believed no one was worthy of his company

• Assuage (verb)

  • To lessen an unpleasant feeling; to pacify

  • My nerves were assuaged by the anesthetic the doctor gave me. 

• Sinecure (noun)

  • A position that requires little work too make a substantial sum of money

  • The title of king appeared to be a sinecure to the peasants, who did not know how difficult it was to run a kingdom. 

• Prescience (noun)

  • Knowing something before it happens; foresight

  • The soothsayer’s prescience was not enough to save Caesar. 

• Malapropism (noun)

  • The mistaking of a word with a similar one; often has a comical effect. 

  • The boy’s family laughed at his malapropism when he asked for broccoli as the “sidekick” for his meal at the restaurant. 

• Phlegmatic (adjective)

  • Unemotional and calm; stoic

  • The firefighter was phlegmatic in the face of danger; he never let his nerves get in his way.

Unit 5:

• Stolid (adjective)

  • Calm, dependable, and showing little emotion

  • The stolid man never broke a sweat when asked to do something.

• Infelicitous (adjective)

  • Unfortunate or not appropriate

  • The joke was delivered well, but the topic was infelicitous

• Replete (adjective, verb, noun)

  • Full of something; to gorge; a large supply

  • Charles Dicken’s work is replete with words that sound archaic by today’s standards. 

• Comestible (noun, adjective)

  • An item of food OR edible

  • The berry, despite being covered in spikes, was comestible upon their removal. 

• Demur (verb, noun)

  • To object to something OR the action of objecting to something

  • The decision would have been unanimous had the politically extremist justice not demurred. 

• Redoubtable (adjective)

  • Formidable, especially as an opponent

  • The knight thought that no opponent could be considered redoubtable until he found himself face-to-face with a sixty-foot-long dragon. 

• Irascible (adjective)

  • Easily angered

  • The irascible CEO once fired one hundred of his employees because they had the audacity to ask for a raise

• Sobriquet (noun)

  • An affectionate nickname

  • Queen Victoria got the sobriquet “The Grandmother of Europe” because so many of her children and grandchildren married monarchs of other European countries.

• Saturnine (adjective)

  • Slow, somber, and bitter

  • The people of England were all saturnine after the death of Queen Elizabeth II

• Subjugate (verb)

  • To take absolute control over, especially by conquest; to make subservient

  • The Martians had subjugated the people of Earth in a matter of days due to their superior technology. 

• Inchoate (adjective)

  • Just begun and so not fully developed OR (of an offense) anticipatory of a further criminal act

  • The inchoate nation had not yet written a law about how to deal with inchoate offenses, such as attempted murder or conspiracy. 

• Incipient (adjective)

  • Just beginning to happen or develop

  • The incipient meteor shower quickly began to light up the sky. 

• Smarmy (adjective)

  • In such a way as to get close to someone by excessive and insincere flattery; actin like a suck-up

  • The smarmy little man tried everything he could to get his boss to like him, complimenting him whenever possible. 

• Unctuous (adjective)

  • In such a way as to get close to someone by excessive and insincere flattery; oily

  • The unctuous girl never failed to note how delicious her mother’s cooking was in the weeks before Christmas; her brother knew she only did it so she could get extra presents. 

• Prodigality (noun)

  • Excessive or extravagant spending; lavishness

  • Marie Antoinette’s prodigality alone was rumored to be a considerable factor in France’s economic crisis. 

• Laconic (adjective)

  • Using few words

  • Why waste time say lot word when few word do trick?

• Cupidity (noun)

  • Greed for money or possessions; excessive desire

  • Little was known about the billionaire, but it was rumored that his cupidity led to him owning many antique paintings and sculptures. 

• Jocular (adjective)

  • Humorous or joking

  • The jocular characteristic of his personality made Robin Williams a fantastic comedian. 

• Hauteur (noun)

  • Haughtiness or arrogance of manner

  • The homeless man walked into the McDonald’s with hauteur after winning two hundred dollars from a scratch-off lottery ticket, more money than he had owned in a long time. 

• Histrionic (adjective, noun)

  • Overly theatrical in character or style OR concerning actors or acting OR melodramatic behavior OR theater performance OR an actor

  • The histrionic’s histrionic behavior was quite fitting for her career.

Unit 6:

• Recumbent (adjective, noun)

  • Lying down OR a bicycle made to be ridden while sitting reclined

  • I lay recumbent on my bicycle, only focusing on the rhythmic pedaling and the sound of the birds singing out their hearts, when suddenly the ground dropped from below my bike wheel and I found myself plummeting off a cliff. 

• Temerity (noun)

  • Excessive confidence/boldness; audacity

  • The boy’s temerity led to him being grounded for a week. 

• Factotum (noun)

  • An employee who does any kind of work required of them

  • Spongebob Squarepants was a factotum for the Krusty Krab; he cooked, cleaned, and did all sorts of odd jobs for his boss. 

• Parvenu (noun)

  • A person of obscure origin who has gained wealth, influence, or celebrity

  • The Great Gatsby is the most acclaimed story of a parvenu in literary history. 

• Potable (adjective, noun)

  • Drinkable OR a drink

  • The potion tasted so bad it was hardly potable

• Simpatico (adjective)

  • Likeable and easy to get along with

  • The regular at McDonald’s was simpatico, and the employees got to know him well before he moved to North Korea. 

• Unexpurgated (adjective)

  • (of a text) complete and containing all the original material; uncensored

  • When he found an ancient copy of the Bible, the archaeologist hoped with all his heart it was at least mostly unexpurgated. 

• Hirsute (adjective)

  • Hairy

  • The old bread had become hirsute from mold after being left at the back of the cabinet for several months. 

• Scion (noun)

  • A young shoot or twig of a plant, especially one cut for grafting or rooting OR a descendant of a notable family

  • The arborist cut off small branchs from trees to graft onto another tree he called “Frankenstein’s Monster.”

• Argentine (adjective, noun)

  • Relating to Argentina OR someone from Argentina OR silvery OR a small fish with a silvery sheen

  • The argentine silverware tempted the burglar, but he knew that it would make to much noise if he stole it. 

• Nascent (adjective)

  • Just coming into existence and beginning to show sings of potential

  • The nascent computer company had just made its first million dollar deal. 

• Acerbic (adjective)

  • (of a comment or style of speaking) sharp and forthright OR tasting sour or bitter

  • The candy was so acerbic that I immediately spat it out. 

• Ameliorate (verb)

  • To make something better

  • Technology has been greatly ameliorated since the moon landing, which makes me wonder why I can’t use my iPhone to land on the moon. 

• Tryst (noun, verb)

  • A private romantic rendezvous between lovers OR to keep a private, romantic rendezvous

  • The tryst Romeo and Juliet planned for was cut short by their deaths. 

• Aggregate (noun, adjective, verb)

  • A whole formed by several (usually conflicting) elements OR something formed by a compacted mass of particles/fragments OR formed/calculated by the total of separate units/items OR to form into a cluster

  • As I aggregated my belongings, I felt a rush of sadness from leaving my home. 

• Iconoclastic (adjective)

  • Characterized by attack on cherished beliefs/institutions

  • The iconoclastic movement promoted pagan ritual and human sacrifice.

• Anhydrous (adjective)

  • Containing no water

  • The salt is always anhydrous; the second it touches water, it explodes. 

• Approbation (noun)

  • Approval or praise

  • The presentation was so good the company received an approbation from the president himself. 

• Congruent (adjective)

  • In agreement OR identical to

  • Congruent triangles have the same side lengths and angles. 

• Effloresce (verb)

  • To lose moisture and become a fine powder when exposed to air OR to reach an optimal stage in development

  • I saw an Apple advertisement for their new iCar stating that it had effloresced; I assumed this meant that it would no longer crash into streetlights when one of the sensors was smudged.

Unit 7:

• Erudite (adjective)

  • Having or showing great knowledge or learning

  • Einstein’s work was the most erudite of his time. 

• Comport (verb, noun)

  • To behave; to accord or agree with OR a bowl-shaped dessert dish with a stem

  • The actions of the Nazis did not comport with the Treaty of Versailles. 

• Sonorous (adjective)

  • (Of a voice or sound) imposingly deep or full

  • The sonorous echo reverberated through the abandoned cooling tower at the old nuclear power plant. 

• Non-belletristic (adjective)

  • Written to convey information rather than to be pleasing to read

  • The non-belletristic biography was the most boring thing I had ever read, but I learned everything there was to know about Bruce Lee. 

• Nouveau riche (noun, adjective)

  • People who have recently acquired wealth and are often seen as ostentatious OR relating to such people

  • The nouveau riche loved to mock the hoi polloi. 

• Concomitant (adjective, noun)

  • Naturally associated with OR a phenomenon that naturally comes along with something

  • Concomitant with his wish to be a doctor was the need to overcome his fear of seeing blood

• Excoriate (verb)

  • To criticize severely OR to wear down or remove the surface of (usually skin)

  • After falling off his motorcycle and severely excoriating his arms, the stuntman no longer applied for such dangerous jobs. 

• Desiccate (verb)

  • To remove the moisture from

  • The silica gel crystals desiccated the package to keep its contents at the perfect low humidity. 

• Peripatetic (adjective, noun)

  • Traveling from place to place over short periods of time OR Aristotelian OR a person to travels frequently OR an Aristotelian philosopher

  • My peripatetic aunt has lived in many houses since she graduated from medical school. 

• Paucity (noun)

  • A lack or scarcity of something

  • The paucity of snacks in my kitchen was deeply troubling. 

• Recusant (noun, adjective)

  • Someone who refuses to comply with authority OR of such a person

  • The recusant student went to detention at least once a week. 

• Pundit (noun)

  • An expert who is frequently called to give opinions about a subject to the public

  • Dr. Fauci became a pundit when he was constantly invited to speak during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

• Mélange (noun)

  • A mixture or blend

  • The mélange of spices in the dish made it the best soup the judge had ever tasted. 

• Dulcet (adjective, noun)

  • Sweet and soothing; a stop for an organ

  • The dulcet tune from the pan flute quickly put the girl to sleep. 

• Ennoblement (noun)

  • Dignity

  • Pip’s ennoblement made him forget the importance of caring for other people until Joe Gargery visited him. 

• Raucous (adjective)

  • Boisterous and disorderly

  • The raucous sounds of the New Year’s celebration triggered the old man’s PTSD. 

• Tacit (adjective)

  • Understood without being stated; implied

  • The lack of a reply to his question made tacit the fact that his brother was upset about something. 

• Fatuous (adjective)

  • Silly and pointless; smugly foolish

  • Some people find the peacocks roaming in the garden to be fatuous. 

• Cognate (adjective, noun)

  • (of a word) clearly derived from the same original word or root OR related/connected OR a word that sounds the same as another with the same meaning OR a blood relative

• Placate (verb)

  • To make someone less hostile

  • The sedative placated the rampaging dinosaur.

Unit 8:

• Lachrymose (adjective)

  • Tearful or given to weeping

  • As the lachrymose girl stubbed her toe, lágrimas fell onto her mejillas. 

• Immure (verb)

  • Put into confinement without consent

  • I was immured in an old man’s basement for most of my life. 

• Chary (adjective)

  • Cautiously or suspiciously reluctant to do something

  • Little Timmy was chary to tell his parents where he found the nuclear launch codes. 

• Cynosure (noun)

  • The center of attention

  • When the time traveler pulled out a semi-automatic, he became the knights’ cynosure.

• Discommode (verb)

  • To cause (someone) inconvenience or trouble

  • This commode is discommoding me; I should call Mario to get it fixed. 

• Incommode (verb)

  • To cause (someone) inconvenience or trouble

  • This commode is incommoding me; I should call Luigi to get it fixed

• Calumny (noun)

  • The making of defamatory statements; slander

  • Filipe’s calumny as he called my mother a cotton-headed ninny muggins ruined my chances of winning the elf of the year award.

• Jocund (adjective)

  • Cheerful and lighthearted; jolly

  • I saw Santa Claus on the cover of the Jocund and Rotund newsletter’s December edition. 

• Xenophobia (noun)

  • Dislike or prejudice against people from other countries; fear of aliens

  • I became a xenophobe after watching the 1979 film Alien starring Sigourney Weaver.

• Mendacious (adjective)

  • Not giving truthful information; lying

  • After sending a mendacious report to her boss, Eva was fired from her job at State Farm.

• Abasement (noun)

  • Humiliation or degradation

  • A basement that is subject to abasement is more likely to be suicidal, whereas attics would much rather take out their frustration on others. 

• Palpable (adjective)

  • (Of a feeling or atmosphere) so intense as to seem almost intangible OR able to be touched or felt. 

  • The stench was so pungent that it seemed almost palpable in the air. 

• Progenitor (noun)

  • An ancestor or parent

  • Genghis Khan is the progenitor of 0.5% of the male population. 

• Paradigm (noun)

  • The prime example of something OR a set of linguistic items that form mutually exclusive choices in particular syntactic roles OR (in the traditional grammar of Latin, Greek, and other inflected languages) a table of all the inflected forms of a particular verb, noun, or adjective, serving as a model for other words of the same conjugation or declension

  • Animal Farm is the paradigm of an allegory. 

• Dearth (noun)

  • A lack of something

  • An example of a dearth is:

• Evocative (adjective)

  • Bringing forward powerful images, memories, or feeling

  • The orchestra’s music was evocative, and made me feel as though I was back in the War of 1812, where my brother died a horrible death. 

• Equivocation (noun)

  • Use of ambiguous language to avoid committing to a story

  • The judge left the courtroom with no more information than when he entered it after the defendant’s constant equivocation. 

• Spurious (adjective)

  • Not being what something claims to be; false

  • The spurious prophet announced that the world would end on September 3, 2034. 

• Fervid (adjective)

  • Intensely enthusiastic or passionate, often too much so

  • My great-grandfather is fervidly political. 

• Ignominy (noun)

  • Public shame or disgrace

  • I fear the ignominy of someone finding out I accidentally launched a thermonuclear bomb.