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| Saturns Rings |
The beautiful picture on the right isn't just because I write and read futuristic and Science Fiction. It's to illustrate the word 'Ansated'.
What's that? I hear you ask. well hear is Michael Quinion's explanation:
'If you wish to confuse your hearers, you might describe the cup or
mug from which you drink your breakfast cuppa as ansated. But it
would merely be an irritatingly superior way of asserting that the
drinking vessel in question has a handle.
When Galileo turned his primitive telescope on Saturn, its famous
rings looked like two blobs either side of the planet (he thought
they were moons). A little later, astronomers with slightly better
instruments saw what seemed to be handles and referred, in a nicely
euphonious phrase, to ansated Saturn (or, as Hevelius described the
planet in 1655, a spherico-ansated figure).
The word now most often turns up in descriptions of ancient sacred
signs. An "ansated cross" is a T shape with a circle at the top, a
symbol that's more commonly called a ankh (from the Egyptian word
for life or soul).
Also known as the Key to the Nile and, to the early
Christians, as an "ansated cross," the ankh was believed
to ensure the immortality of every god and goddess.
[Exploring Spellcraft, by Gerina Dunwich, 2001.]
"Ansated" is from Latin "ansa", a handle. In Latin the plural of
"ansa" is "ansae".'
So now I'm just waiting for the chance to use the phrase - "The starship approached a spheruco-ansated figure...
*World Wide Words is copyright (c) Michael Quinion 2011. All rights reserved. The World Wide Words website is at http://www.worldwidewords.org
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Also available on Kindle
Just how is my pea brain supposed to remember that one?
ReplyDeleteTrouble with using words like that in a story is that most dummies, (eg.me), would be taken out of the story. Because they don't know that difficult word...
You're too smart for me sweetie!LOL!
Lol, Mary dear friend! I have to admit I hadn't come across the word myself, until I read it on Michael Quinion's site, although I'm familiar with the 'crux ansata' or looped cross but hadn't realised the Latin root.
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