Sunday, February 18, 2007

WORD A DAY

TERPSICHOREAN: of or relating to dancing

In Greek and Roman mythology, Terpsichore was one of the nine Muses, those graceful sister-goddesses who presided over learning and the arts. She was the patron of dance and choral song (and later lyric poetry), and in artistic representations she is often shown dancing and holding a lyre. Her name, which earned an enduring place in English through the adjective "terpsichorean," literally means "dance-enjoying," from terpsis, meaning "enjoyment," and choros, meaning "dance." Choros is also the source of "choregraphy" and "chorus" (those "choruses" in Athenina drama consisted of dancers as well as singers). The only other word we know that incorporates terpsis is "terpodion," an obsolete term for a piano-like musical instrument that was invented in 1816 but never really caught on.

No comments:


Disclosure Policy

This policy is valid from 24 January 2007 This blog is a personal blog written and edited by me. For questions about this blog, please contact John @ JohnH985@gmail.com. This blog accepts forms of cash advertising, sponsorship, paid insertions or other forms of compensation. This blog abides by word of mouth marketing standards. We believe in honesty of relationship, opinion and identity. The compensation received may influence the advertising content, topics or posts made in this blog. That content, advertising space or post will be clearly identified as paid or sponsored content. The owner(s) of this blog is compensated to provide opinion on products, services, websites and various other topics. Even though the owner(s) of this blog receives compensation for our posts or advertisements, we always give our honest opinions, findings, beliefs, or experiences on those topics or products. The views and opinions expressed on this blog are purely the bloggers' own. Any product claim, statistic, quote or other representation about a product or service should be verified with the manufacturer, provider or party in question. This blog does not contain any content which might present a conflict of interest. To get your own policy, go to http://www.disclosurepolicy.org/