SUBDOLOUS

[Dr. Goodword]

• subdolous •

Pronunciation: sêb-dê-lês • Hear it!

Part of Speech: Adjective

Meaning: Sly, crafty, devious, surreptitiously deceptive.

Notes: Today's Good Word sleeps with others of its ilk beginning with sub- "under, beneath" and referring to suspicious behavior; I have in mind now words like: subterfuge, suspicious and sub rosa. The adverb for today's adjective is subdolously and the noun subdolousness is preferable to subdolosity.

In Play: Today's Good Word can refer to underhanded activities: "Prohibition failed due to the subdolous supply of alcohol the underworld imported and distributed almost at will." However, it is equally at home with innocence: "No one noticed that Winfred's hand had subdolously sought and found Emmanuel's beneath the table."

Word History: The Latin preposition sub "(from) under, below" was very similar to super "over, above", differing mostly in the -er suffix. In Greek, however, these two prepositions came out as hyper and hypo, with an expectable replacement of [s] by [h]. We see these two words in English words like hypersensitive "oversensitive" and hypodermic, the needle that goes under the skin. Both the "over" and "under" word seem to have begun with [s], yet in the Germanic languages we find offspring like German über "over" and English over for super while the root corresponding to sub is now Geman auf "on" and English up, from the original meaning "from under". Why the Germanic words have no initial [s] sound is a mystery. (The suggester of today's Good Word, however, is no mystery but the subdolous Mark Bailey, a Senior Lexiterian in the Alpha Agora.)

[Perry]

The good Doctors explanations are usually excellent. In this case I would have liked to see a bit more about dolous, although the exegesis on sub was interesting.

[Dr. Goodword]

Rarely used and not very recently. Also spelled dolose There is a legal term, the original Latin, dolus used in two expressions, dolus malus "bad deceit" and, wouldn't you know it, dolus bonus "good, acceptable deceit".

Subdolous isn't very common, either, but is occurs more often and has been published more recently than dolous.

[Perry]

and, wouldn't you know it, dolus bonus "good, acceptable deceit".

"Talk to me baby. Tell me lies."

Thanks for the info!

[gailr]

Euphemism:
dolus bonus or dolus malus?

[Bailey]

now I'm crafty and decitful, yeah well ya'll don't know the half of it.

Mark Sly-crafty-devious-surreptitiously-deceptive Bailey

[Stargzer]

From the Luciferous Logolepsy

dolus bonus
phr. - good deceit: in roman and civil law, permissible bargaining and cunning in selling, as in the case of a merchant's over-praising of his products

dolus malus
phr. - evil deceit: in roman and civil law, unlawful deceit or misrepresentation growing out of evil intent or malice

In either case, caveat emptor.

[Bailey]

call me crazy but I keep seeing dolorous when I see this word. Of course if I deceive you and you buy my product you might be feeling a bit dolorous.

mark call-me-crazy-anyway Bailey

[Stargzer]

[
. . . Word History: The Latin preposition sub "(from) under, below" . . . (The suggester of today's Good Word, however, is no mystery but the subdolous Mark Bailey, a Senior Lexiterian in the Alpha Agora.)

Are Bailey's henchmen his subdudes?

[Bailey]

[
. . . Word History: The Latin preposition sub "(from) under, below" . . . (The suggester of today's Good Word, however, is no mystery but the subdolous Mark Bailey, a Senior Lexiterian in the Alpha Agora.)

Are Bailey's henchmen his subdudes?

henchmen? yup!
Mark topdude Bailey

[gailr]

Pssst, Bailey: henchmen are sooo last millenium. All the cool kids now have henchpersons.