• despicable •
Pronunciation: di-spik-ê-bêl, des-pi-kê-bêl • Hear it!
Part of Speech: Adjective
Meaning: That should be despised, deserving scorn, vile, contemptible, repulsive.
Notes: This word wandered so far away from its origin, despise, that some folks are resorting to despisable in its place. Its pronunciation, too, was originally [despikêbêl], but in the 20th century the accent slowly migrated from the first to the second syllable. The adverb is despicably, and the noun, either despicability or the clumsier despicableness.
In Play: Unfortunately, we still find too many occasions to use this word: "The genocidal aspect of World War II made it even more despicable than wars in general." Again: "The suggestion that a small, contained war can prevent a larger one is a despicable form of warmongering."
Word History: Today's Good Word is a redesign of Late Latin despicabilis, the passive adjective of despicor "to look down on", comprising de "down (from)" + spic-, the combining form of spec(ere) "to look at". Specere is a remodeling of PIE spek'-/spok'- "to look at, watch", source also of Sanskrit spasati "sees", Armenian spasem "to expect", and German spähen "to spy". An odd thing happened in Greek: the P and K exchanged places to produce skep-/skop-, as in skopein "to look at, consider" and skopos "a watcher, lookout". This form is found in many Hellenic borrowings, like telescope, microscope, fluoroscope, endoscope, and oscilloscope. (Now kudos for Maureen Koplow, for noticing that today's twisted Good Word was missing from our collection and mentioning it to us.)
