Today’s words are from Quicksilver by Neal Stephenson. The definitions are from my Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary (1979).
In a description of an older man:
His ears are elongated and have grown a radiant fringe of lanugo. p. 37
lanugo: a dense cottony or downy growth
Beneath him several figures swam in murky pools of lanthorn-light. p. 51
lanthorn: (chiefly British) lantern
Sizar is used several times in a section about life at Cambridge in the 1600s. This quote has something of a definition (the boy in question turns out to be Isaac Newton):
The boy was a sizar — a nobody from the provinces trying to escape from the lower class by taking holy orders and angling for a deaconage in some gale-chafed parish. p. 60
sizar: a student (as in the university of Cambridge) who receives an allowance toward his college expenses and who orig. acted as a servant to other students in return for this allowance
Illustration from Cambridge University Library exhibit about Isaac Newton
In this passage, Isaac Newton is asking for assistance with his famous experiment that involved using a darning needle to change the shape of his own eye socket.
“I need you to draw a reticule on a leaf of paper and then hold it up at various measured distances from my cornea — as you do, I’ll move the darning needle up and down — creating greater and lesser distortions in the shape of my eyeball — I say, I’ll do that with one hand, and take notes of what I see with the other.” p. 72
I thought I knew the word reticule as a bag — the dictionary confirms that it’s a woman’s drawstring bag used as carryall. But a second meaning is as a synonym for reticle which must be what we’re getting at here.
reticle: a system of lines, dots, cross hairs, or wires in the focus of the eyepiece of an optical instrument
Wondrous Words Wednesday is hosted by Bermudaonion’s Weblog. Kathy says: “Wondrous Words Wednesday is a weekly meme where we share new (to us) words that we’ve encountered in our reading.”
