Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Wonderous Words Wednesday (3)



It's time again for BermudaOnion's Wonderous Words Wednesday. This week's unfamiliar word comes from Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle (which I just finished! Soon I might shut up about it, but not yet.)

Trephenation: n.
Removal of a circular piece of bone, especially of the skull, by a trephine. Also called trepanation.


We finally performed something like trephenation on our client, creating a battle-weary but still reasonably presentable hollowed-out tureen. (Page 263)

(Even Firefox doesn't recognize this word, so I'm in good company!)

*Dictionary.com didn't recognize the spelling of this word, but did have two alternate spellings which made sense. The definition above actually goes with the trephination spelling.*

6 comments:

ibeeeg said...

Interesting word. Is it curious when I search engine does not even recognize the word? :)

bermudaonion said...

Well, I'm going to have to look up trephine now! Great word. Thanks for participating today!

avisannschild said...

This sounds like quite the dangerous procedure, from what I've read on the Wikipedia site!

Mercy's Maid said...

It's definitely not a procedure I want to have. :)

Mo said...

interesting word; not something I ever want to undergo, but a good word, just the same! LoL...Glad to see you playing along with this one.

Hope you're having a good week, my friend!

Margot said...

I read this book about six months ago and haven't stopped talking about it yet. It had a huge impact on my and my habits.