Wordly Wise Vocab
Terms
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- Utopia
- a place or state of perfect social and political conditions
- Declaim
- to recite something in teh style of a public speech; to speak in a loud theatrical way
- coalesce
- to grow together, to unite to form a whole
- obdurate
- resistant to persuasion, inflexible
- demagogue
- a leader who seeks power by appealing to people's emotions and prejudices and by making false claims
- sedulous
- completed with careful perserverance; diligent
- acolyte
- one who attends or assists; a follower
- trenchant
- expressed with vigor and penetrating insight; keenly perceptive
- prescience
- foresight; knowledge beforehand of events
- covert
- not openly acknowledged; secret
- delineate
- to describe vividly in detail
- bibulous
- given to the consumption of alcoholic drinks
- encomium
- an expression of warm and enthusiastiv praise; a tribute
- valedictory
- a farewell adress
- protagonist
- the chief character in a drama or story
- immure
- to confine within or as if within walls; to imprison
- internecine
- marked by slaughter; mutually destructive
- quadrennial
- occuring every four years
- absolve
- to clear guilt, or to free from a promise or a responsiblity
- germane
- pertinent and fitting
- adumbrate
- to foreshadow in an indirect way; to outline in a sketchy way
- congenital
- existing at or dating from birth
- ineluctable
- not to be avoided or changed; inevitable
- elan
- a lively spirit with a distinctive style
- invoke
- to appeal to earnestly
- apothegm
- a short, instructive saying
- hiatus
- a gap in time
- prototype
- a thing that serves as an example, the original
- aspersion
- a defamatory expression; slander
- coadjuator
- one who works with another
- apothecary
- one who prepares and sells ointments, drugs, and similar items for medicinal purposes
- charlatan
- on who falsely claims
- imbibe
- to comsume, absord mentally
- ascetic
- refraining from self-indulgence
- perennial
- lasting indefinitly or recurring
- amalgam
- an alloy of mercury and other metals
- flora
- plants considered as a group in a particular area
- denizen
- an in habitant, resident or frequenter
- beneficent
- doing or preducing good
- savant
- person with detailed knowledge in a specialized feild
- antediluvian
- very old fashioned
- obviate
- to prevent or make unecessary, to get rid of
- nostrum
- a medicine or remedy whole effectiveness has not been proven
- putative
- commonly excepted or supposed
- doyen
- a senior member of a group, especailly one who is highly respected
- expatiate
- to speak or write about in great detail
- laudable
- praiseworthy
- ostensible
- only seeming so
- mandate
- clear command or instruction
- benighted
- existing in a state of darkness
- credo
- a strongly held belief or custom
- iconoclast
- one who attacks established beliefs
- approbation
- expresion of approval, praise
- eschew
- to shun, stay away from
- recalcitrant
- unwilling to accept another's authority; stubbornly defiant
- empirical
- based on experiance or observation as opposed to theory
- risible
- provoking or causing laughter
- bourgeois
- middle class
- indigence
- extreme poverty
- stultify
- to render useless
- chicanery
- clever diception through misleading
- stratagem
- clever scheme for gaining an end
- egregious
- conspicuously bad, flagernant
- pecuniary
- having to do with money
- archaic
- relating or belonging to earlier time
- paroxysm
- sudden violent uncontrolable action
- rectitude
- high moral character
- vandetta
- blood feud
- execrate
- to utterly abhor, to denounce as detestable
- carouse
- to take part in drunken merrymaking
- fealty
- faithfullness, allegiance
- dissemble
- to conceal with an intent to decieve
- microcosm
- a small system that operates or developes like a larger system
- contentious
- causing or marked by arguement or conflict
- ramification
- an outgrowth of a simple idea or plan
- insidious
- seemingly harmless but actually being dangerous
- genealogy
- study of the history of you family or how they are related to eachother
- brackish
- salty
- precursor
- person or thing that comes before and indicate approach of another
- topor
- state of mental or physical sluggishness
- dolorous
- causing or marked by pain misery or sorrow
- inebriated
- deprived of good sense of judgement
- presentiment
- feeling that somehting is about to occur
- endemic
- widespread to a certain area
- cognitive
- relating to mental processes
- actuate
- to cause to put into mechanical motion
- dissertation
- a lengthy discussion of topic
- fecund
- intellectually or artistically productive, creative
- interloper
- one who intrudes on or interferes in the affairs of others
- abjure
- to renounce formally, under oath
- amorphous
- without a definite shape, formless
- animus
-
an attitude or spirit within a person that strongly influences him or her
a deep seated ill will - dichotomy
- division into two distint parts
- exemplar
- an example or model, and ideal one
- herculean
- of extraordinary power, size, or difficulty
- inchoate
- not fully formed or realized, just begun
- invidious
- likely to cause resentment
- mélange
- mixture of disimilar things
- nefarious
- very wicked
- nihilism
- veiwpoint which denies meaning of life
- ratify
- to approve, or verify
- subsume
- to encompass in a larger or more comprehensive group; to include
- variegated
- varied as to form, type or color
- vitiate
- to impair or weaken
- aborigine
- an original inhabitant
- abrogate
- to put an end to; to abolish or repeal
- appurtenance
- an item of equipment; accesory
- bivouac
- a temporary camp/shelter, to stay in such a camp
- cetacean
- a member of the order of marine mammals that includes whales and dolphins
- decry
- to criticize strongly; to denounce
- desuetude
- a sate of disuse
- leviathan
- anything that is of enourmaous size
- mawkish
- excessively sentimental
- misapprehen
- to fail to understand correctly
- parochial
- limited or narrow in scope or outlook-of or related to church
- purvey
- to be in the buissness of supplying goods, especially food or provisions, for use
- recourse
- a turning to someone or something for aid
- replete
- well supplied, full
- waive
- to give up as a right, to forgo
- apposite
- highly relevant, apt
- calumny
- a false accuasation meant to hurt someone's rep; slander
- domain
- an area or territory over which control is exercised, a field of knowledge
- dorsal
- of on or near the back
- enervate
- to lessen the vigor of, to engeeble
- epicure
- one with descriminating taste, especially but not exclusively realting to food and drink
- exculpate
- to clear from alleged guilt or fault
- heterogenious
- differing in kin or parts, varied
- infinitesimal
- extremely small in size or quantity
- lateral
- of at from or towards the side
- primeval
- of or realting to the earliest ages
- quintessence
- the best or most typical example
- serrated
- haveing a saw toothed edge
- veritable
- being in fact the thing named or described; literally so
- viviparous
- producing living young instead of eggs, in the manner of most mammals
- acumen
- keeness of the mind; shredmess
- apotheosis
- the elecation of a person or thing to divine status
- askew
- turned or tweisted to one side, out of line
- chasten
- to correct or improve by discipling; to cause to be more careful
- demarcation
- the act or process of setting a boundary
- dictum
- a statement or pronouncement
- erstwhile
- of an earlier time, former
- forte
- an activity at which a person exceeds
- habitue
- a person who regularly goes to a particular place
- nonplus
- to couse to be at a loss as to what to say or do
- peripatetic
- of or relating to going from plave to place, especially on foot
- prodigal
- one who spends lavishly or wastefully
- sycophant
- one who uses flattery to win favor or to ingratieate him or herslef
- vacuous
- lacking intelligence or idas; intellectuallty emptiness
- wraith
- a shadowy or ghostlike figure
- cacophony
- harsh or jarring sound
- confrere
- comrade; colleague
- convoke
- to summon or call together for a meeting
- filial
- of relating to or befitting a son or daughter
- fractious
- tending to be troublesome; irritable
- fulminate
- to express with denunciation often in an exploseve way
- jocular
- give to or characterized by joking;playful
- nugatory
- having no force or effect
- obloquy
- an utterance of kenunciation, the condition of one who is held in contmpt for a shamelful action
- palpable
- easy to touch or feel, heasy to see hear or recognize
- parity
- equality of rand or value
- peruse
- to read through something either casually or closely
- polemic
- an argument to refute a position or opinion, one who aggressively advocates a position
- supplicate
- to ask for humbly, to plead/beg
- temporize
- to act evasively in order to achieve a compromise or to gain time