This week's theme: words that have many unrelated meanings.
fizgig (FIZ-gig) noun
1. A squib: a type of firework made with damp powder that makes a
hissing sound when exploding.
[From fizz, a clipping of fizzle, from fysel (to break wind).]
2. A kind of top spun by pulling a string wound around it.
3. A flirty, frivolous girl.
[From Middle English gig (a flighty girl, a whipping-top).]
4. A kind of harpoon with barbs for spearing fish.
[From Spanish fisga (fish spear).]
5. A police informer.
[Australian slang.]
Today's word in Visual Thesaurus: http://visualthesaurus.com/?w1=fizgig
-Anu Garg (garg wordsmith.org)
"When [the speaker] argues that philosophies and theologies are
the fizgigs of the brain, he expresses an idea which Browning
has repeatedly expressed in 'Ferishtah's Fancies'."
Edward Dowden; Robert Browning (biography); 1904.
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............................................................................
We are healed of a suffering only by expressing it to the full. -Marcel
Proust, novelist (1871-1922)
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Pronunciation:
http://wordsmith.org/words/fizgig.wav
http://wordsmith.org/words/fizgig.ram
Permalink: http://wordsmith.org/words/fizgig.html
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