Word of the Day for Wednesday, February 8, 2012
piacular \pahy-AK-yuh-ler\, adjective:
1. Expiatory; atoning; reparatory.
2. Requiring expiation; sinful or wicked.
The journey to obtain scriptures in the Western Heaven is, for Tripitaka and his disciples, also the piacular journey of return to Buddha, and like the Odysseus of the Homeric poem, the scripture pilgrim must pass through appalling obstacles for past offenses against the gods.
-- Anthony C. Yu," Journey to the West"
…and this high-ranking Greek guy actually came around to 1009 after Saturday's supper to apologize on behalf of practically the entire Chandris shipping line and to assure me that ragged-necked Lebanese heads were even at that moment rolling down various corridors in piacular recompense for my having had to carry my own bag.
-- David Foster Wallace, "A Supposedly Fun Things I'll Never Do Again"
Piacular is derived from two Latin roots: pia, which is related to the word pious, and a variation of the suffix -cule which denotes a diminutive nouns, like particle.
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