• colligate •
Pronunciation: kah-lê-gayt • Hear it!
Part of Speech: Verb, transitive
Meaning: 1. To tie or bind together, to interconnect. 2. To find a principle that explains several things previously thought to be unrelated, to pull together in a single explanation.
Notes: The noun for today's word is, expectably, colligation. Several adjectives are available, including colligate itself, pronounced a bit differently [kah-lê-gêt] "tied together", colligable "capable of being colligated", and collegative "tending to collect together", though this adjective is used mostly in chemistry to describe situations that depend on the quantity of molecules rather than their quality or nature (size, weight, etc.)
In Play: We have seldom seen or heard today's Good Word used in its literal sense since the 17th century but that doesn't preclude its use today: "The necklace comprised a perfect set of pearls colligated by a silk thread." Today colligate is used to refer to abstract tying together: "The evidence in the murder case was substantial but the prosecutor could not colligate them so that pointed to a single suspect."
Word History: Today's Good Word comes from Latin colligare "tie or bind together", based on con "(together) with" + ligare "to tie, bind". If you find it remindful of collect, you have good reason. The past participle of colligere is collectus, which English appropriated as an entirely different word. Latin prefixes ending on N like con underwent a process called 'assimilation', that is to say, they took on the traits of the consonant following them. When added to words beginning on L and R, they became identical, as in correct and collect. Before consonants formed with the lips, like M, B, and P, N became M, as in comment, combine, and compute. The prefix in- behaved similarly, giving us words like impolite, irreverent, and illegal. (Thank you David Ross for suggesting the word that colligates all the different strands free knowledge that make up today's Good Word.)
COLLIGATE
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COLLIGATE
• The Good Dr. Goodword
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- Great Grand Panjandrum
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... or perhaps a scandal wherein a Presidential canine gets too close to the sheep it's supposed to be protecting ...
Regards//Larry
"To preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms, and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them."
-- Attributed to Richard Henry Lee
"To preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms, and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them."
-- Attributed to Richard Henry Lee
Hmmm...better a Scots Terrier than a wining terroir or a holy terror?
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- Great Grand Panjandrum
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We're talking a hypothetical pooch here, a Lassie Gone Wild ... maybe down along the Rio Grande in Laredo ... a Border Colligate Scandal ... complete with a group of loyal but clumsy Cubans and a roll of masking tape ...
Stargzer remembers when that first came out. It's so nice to find it to read it again. La plus ça change ...
Stargzer remembers when that first came out. It's so nice to find it to read it again. La plus ça change ...
Regards//Larry
"To preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms, and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them."
-- Attributed to Richard Henry Lee
"To preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms, and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them."
-- Attributed to Richard Henry Lee
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