abeyance

Use this forum to suggest Good Words for Professor Beard.
Klimt
Lexiterian
Posts: 112
Joined: Wed Jul 04, 2007 12:25 pm

abeyance

Postby Klimt » Fri Nov 12, 2010 7:26 pm

1. The condition of being temporarily set aside; suspension: held the plan in abeyance.

John, meanwhile, sat collapsed, his chin sunk upon his chest, his mind in abeyance.

Katharine's common sense, which had been in abeyance for the past week or two, still failed her, and she could only ask, "But where's your luggage?

But in a very short time, all these efforts at communal legislation fell into abeyance.
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Whoever wants to know something about me - as an artist which alone is significant - they should look attentively at my pictures and there seek to recognise what I am and what I want.

Perry
Great Grand Panjandrum
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Location: Asheville, NC

Postby Perry » Sat Nov 13, 2010 6:12 pm

abeyance
1520s, from Anglo-Fr. abeiance "suspension," also "expectation (especially in a lawsuit)," from O.Fr. abeance "aspiration, desire," noun of condition of abeer "aspire after, gape" from à "at" + ba(y)er "be open," from L. *batare "to yawn, gape" (see abash). Originally in O.Fr. a legal term, "condition of a person in expectation or hope of receiving property;" it turned around in English law to mean "condition of property temporarily without an owner" (1650s). Root baer is also the source of English bay (2) "recessed space," as in "bay window."
When it comes to pain, I would rather have my pain abate, than be in abeyance!
"Time is nature's way of keeping everything from happening all at once. Lately it hasn't been working."
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