Matutinal

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Dr. Goodword
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Matutinal

Postby Dr. Goodword » Tue Jun 21, 2022 5:04 pm

• matutinal •


Pronunciation: (US) mê-tu-tê-nêl, (UK) mæ-chu-tai-nêl • Hear it!

Part of Speech: Adjective

Meaning: 1. A division of crepuscular meaning "active or alert in the morning, rising early". It is the contrary of vespertine "active at dusk". 2. Related to morning, early.

Notes: This word seems to be pronounced different in the US from its pronunciation in the UK. It evolved as an adjective to the noun matutine "early hours, matins". It had an alternate, matutinary, which arose briefly in the US in the 19th century. The adverb is, of course, matutinally. Don't forget to double the L.

In Play: This word is often used in reference to the period of activity of animals: "Blue sharks, bees, and gerbils are more active during the matutinal hours." However, this word may refer to anything happening early or in the morning. "Lester loved taking his constitutional early in the morning, while the matutinal dews still twinkled on the grass."

Word History: Today's Good Word was borrowed from French matutinal, which evolved from Latin matutinalis "pertaining to morning". This adjective was created from the noun Matuta, the name of the Roman goddess of dawn. This name was derived from PIE ma- "good, timely", source also of Latin manus "good" and maneana "early" with an -n suffix. From the same PIE word came Latin maturus "ripe, timely", Breton and Welsh mad "good", Irish maith "good" with the -t suffix. Latin maneana became mañana "tomorrow" in Spanish and amanhã "tomorrow" in Portuguese. (Paula Ward entered a conversation with her husband departing from crepuscular about words referring all the other times of day and night when animals are active. Today's eye-opening Good Word is the only one we hadn't already covered.)
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George Kovac
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Re: Matutinal

Postby George Kovac » Wed Jun 22, 2022 11:22 am

Paula, What a great word!

It is never too early (or too late) to add to one's vocabulary. When my (now adult) son was in kindergarten, the school encouraged use of correct, adult words. The kids thought that was normal conversational practice, and would eagerly apply the new words they learned to whatever context they thought worked--a great lifelong skill to develop. After a lesson on the habits of night-time animals, my son told us that the father of one of his classmates was "nocturnal." Bewildered, we asked our son for more detail. It turned out that the dad in question was a policeman, and was working the night shift.
"Every battle of ideas is fought on the terrain of language." Zia Haider Rahman, New York Times 4/8/2016

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Slava
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Re: Matutinal

Postby Slava » Wed Jun 22, 2022 1:18 pm

About using 'adult' words correctly: my brother once wrote something for school using our mother's "Dictionary of Difficult Words". The teacher couldn't read it and failed him on it.
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Re: Matutinal

Postby David Myer » Thu Jun 30, 2022 6:34 am

These are interesting anecdotes. And they serve to show how formal education is fundamentally unjust but of course because of that, teaches resilience, patience, tolerance etc.

I remember my very bright nephew as a four year old, was identifying items from illustrations. He correctly identified an elbow, but failed the test because the answer on the card was 'arm'. That taught him all sorts of things.


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