Amorous

[Dr. Goodword]

• amorous •

Pronunciation: æm-ê-rês • Hear it!

Part of Speech: Adjective

Meaning: Filled with love, in love, expressing love—anything having to do with romantic love.

Notes: Yes, tomorrow is the day of love, St. Valentine's Day. We cannot let the occasion pass without acknowledgement. Amorous is the adjective of amour "love", the French (and British) spelling of amor also used now in the US. Amorously is its adverb and amorousness, its noun.

In Play: Today's Good Word refers to any aspect of plying the waters of romantic love: "I think all those amorous glances from Rick O'Shea are wasted on Miss Debote." It should certainly be in the vocabulary of anyone who takes St. Valentine's Day seriously: "Val Tyne always takes his wife out for an amorous evening on the town about this time of the year." (Guess what Val's middle initial is.)

Word History: Now, let's begin with the words that are NOT related to amorous. First, there is amortize (it is based on mort- "death"), and amoral (though prudes may disagree that this one is unrelated to amorous). Amorous comes from the name of the Roman god of love, Amor, a word sometimes used in English for "love" in the French spelling, as mentioned above, amour. The basic verb here is amare, the root of which comes from the imitative sounds of a baby calling it mother, ma-ma, less the initial M. Even though it is not Mothers Day, it serves us all well to remember that the touchstone of love is motherly love—etymologically speaking, that is.

[LukeJavan8]

How many of us remember amor, amas, amat?

[damoge]

"it serves us all well to remember that the touchstone of love is motherly love—etymologically speaking, that is."
Why did you decide to imply exceptions? Your statement applies etymologically and biologically as well.
If there are cases (and we all know there are) where this is betrayed or withheld, those are the exceptions.

Debby

[LukeJavan8]

Were you speaking to me, Debby?
I was just remembering sitting in Latin Class,
and that was the first conjugation we studied.

[damoge]

Actually, Luke, I was speaking to the Good Doctor.
I too remember amo amas amat, and my mother's joking
Cicero, Ciceras, Cicerat (first C hard) even though that could not exist.

[LukeJavan8]

Thanks, good to know.
Here in Nebraska back in the 1960's when every school taught
Latin, the Public schools pronounced the "C" as a hard C or K,
so your mother was actually correct around here. The parochial
schools used Liturgical Latin and the "C" was soft as in S.
Good discussion.

[Dr. Goodword]

Two Cambridge students were sitting in the local pub when one asks the other, "Would you decline a tequila?"
The other replies, "tequila, tequilae, tequilae, tequilam, tequila."

[call_copse]

[LukeJavan8]

Love it, Doc.