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defenestration

Posted: Sat Oct 01, 2005 1:26 am
by KatyBr
a good word we haven't seen in the WOTD in a long time
de·fen·es·tra·tion (d-fn-strshn)
n.
An act of throwing someone or something out of a window.



[From de- + Latin fenestra, window.]
Kt
(there are always somethings best defenestrated, eh?)

Posted: Sat Oct 01, 2005 6:00 am
by frank
Image

"La rencontre au château de Prague tourne au pugilat. Deux gouverneurs détestés du roi, Wilhelm Slavata et Jaroslav Martinic, sont jetés par la fenêtre avec leur domestique Fabricius. Les victimes tombent heureusement sur un tas de fumier et s'en tirent sans mal !"

Defenstration doesn't always damage the health, but it can cause (30 year of) war...

Frank

Posted: Sat Oct 01, 2005 12:31 pm
by Brazilian dude
It's amazing how Latin fenestra evolved so much to become Portuguese fresta (a slit).

Brazilian dude

Posted: Sat Oct 01, 2005 12:54 pm
by Flaminius
From French fenêtre, I assume the first 'e' in fenestra had the tendency to weeken or disappear. The resultant fnestra may have easily become frestra/fresta in languages whose R is a trill.

Fl,am

Posted: Sat Oct 01, 2005 1:55 pm
by Brazilian dude
Rrright.

Brazilian dude

Posted: Sat Oct 01, 2005 2:38 pm
by M. Henri Day
Dropping a vowel here and there, the Latin term gave rise to, e g, Swedish «fönster», German «fenster». Interestingly enough, the terms used in Norway and Denmark (but not, as we have seen, in Sweden), «vindu» and «vindue», resp, are both derived from the same old Norse term, ««vindauga» - an eye (opening) to the wind - which gave rise to English «window»....

Posted: Sat Oct 01, 2005 2:48 pm
by Brazilian dude
And there's also Dutch venster.

Brazilian dude

Posted: Mon Oct 03, 2005 12:24 pm
by tcward
And southern redneck winder. ;)

(Surely you've all seen the Microsoft Winders joke before...)

-Tim

Posted: Tue Oct 04, 2005 11:13 am
by M. Henri Day
Is that what the late, great Ray Charles meant by «Georgia on my mind» ?...

Henri

Re: defenestration

Posted: Sat Nov 17, 2012 12:15 pm
by eberntson
This was a popular work with me in the 70s, I learned the word from Monty Pythons Flying Circus; there is an episode where a lot of people self defenestrate.

However, I just watched a video about the word (see Merriam Webster), and it mentioned the Defenestration of Prague I & II. The 2nd, contributed to the start of the 30 Years War, see Frank's reference above. This is a case where truth is stranger than fiction.

Re: defenestration

Posted: Sat Nov 17, 2012 1:17 pm
by Perry Lassiter
Years ago my then teen daughter watched an afternoon sit-com of some sort where a lead character kept getting murdered. (Shades of Fearless Fosdick with swiss cheese holes all over him: He killed me, but it wasn't fatal.) i happened to walk through the house that afternoon and witnessed Natalie (?) being defenestrated. TV has no problems resorting to either defenestration or resurrection.

Re: defenestration

Posted: Sat Nov 17, 2012 2:48 pm
by Slava
I don't recall just where I saw it, but when a major figure at Microsoft recently and suddenly departed, the headline referred to his defenestration. :D

Re: defenestration

Posted: Sat Nov 17, 2012 5:31 pm
by Philip Hudson
eberntson: Thanks for pulling this chestnut out of the embers of past Good Word Suggestions. Although I had never seen the word defenestration before, I immdiately knew it's meaning. Strange though, my mind went to German to get window (fenster) instead of the Latin (fenestra). My Celtic ancestors would be ashamed of me.

Re: defenestration

Posted: Sat Nov 17, 2012 6:39 pm
by Slava
By-the-by, here's where the Good Doctor gave it his special treatment: http://www.alphadictionary.com/goodword ... fenestrate

Interesting sense of humor, no?

Re: defenestration

Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 2:08 am
by eberntson
@Philip: your welcome!
@Slave: Like a perfect dry martini, humor is best with only a airing of vermouth and a twist. Drier the better. 8)