Today's Word "Obscurant"
Published in Vocabulary
obscurant \ehb-SKYU-rehnt\ (adjective) - That which obscures (adjective); one who obscures, prevents inquiry or enlightenment (noun).
"Lindsey felt that our cardinal problem was that the halls of government were inhabited by too many obscurants threatened by the free flow of information."
From "obscure," borrowed from Latin obscurus "dark, shady," comprising ob- "toward" + sku-r from PIE *(s)keu- "cover, conceal." With the [s], which comes and goes among Indo-European languages, this root turns up in English "skin," "skim," "scum," and Old Norse sky "cloud", borrowed to distinguish the sky from heaven (Old English heofan "sky, heaven"). The root turns up in Greek skutos "hide" and Sanskrit sku "hide, conceal." Without the initial [s], it became "hide" and "hose" in English. For another serving of PIE, read "How is a Hippo like a Feather?" in yourDictionary's library.
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