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Today's Word "termagant"

A scolding, nagging, bad-tempered woman on

Published in Vocabulary

termagant \TUR-muh-guhnt\ (noun) - A scolding, nagging, bad-tempered woman; a shrew.

(adjective) - Overbearing; shrewish; scolding.

"For you are the witch Magrit, the horrid harridan, the repulsive termagant, the fustigant fury, the execrable harpy, the verminous virago, the loathsome she-wolf." -- Eric Flint, 'Forward the Mage'

 

Termagant comes from Middle English Termagaunt, alteration of Tervagant, from Old French. Termagant was an imaginary Muslim deity represented in medieval morality plays as extremely violent and turbulent. By the sixteenth century, termagant was used for a boisterous, brawling, turbulent person of either sex, but eventually it came to refer only to women.


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