• afflatus •
Printable Version Pronunciation: ê-flay-tês • Hear it!
Part of Speech: Noun
Meaning: Creative inspiration from a divine or supernatural power, a powerful muse.
Notes: Today's Good Word is encountered more frequently than its synonym from the same root, afflation. The latter comes from the verb afflate "to blow upon; to inspire". This verb provides a rather odd adjective, afflatitious "by divine inspiration". Dictionaries avoid postulating a plural of today's noun, which is used both as a regular and mass noun. However, afflatuses will always do.
In Play: Afflatuses tend to be divine but the only true test is whether they are supernatural: "Somewhere between Breakfast at Tiffany's and In Cold Blood, Capote's divine afflatus seems to have been replaced by a satanic one." They are also closely associated with the arts: "Gwendolyn's afflatus certainly was at her service in writing her latest novel, for it is absolutely divine."
Word History: Today's remarkable word is Latin afflatus unmolested, the past participle of afflare "to blow on" from ad "to, on" + flare "to blow". The Proto-Indo-European root underlying flare is *bhlo-. The [bh] became [f] at the beginning of a Latin word, though, so this root became flare, which means "to blow"—from either end, apparently, since it also underlies flatulent. The [b] remained in Germanic languages so this root turns up in English blow and bladder, two words related due to the Celtic people's penchant for blowing into bladders called bag-pipes to make music. May your afflatus blow some inspiration your way today.
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