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Posted by Christopher Waldrop
July 26, 2008 |
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Every once in a while I run across an obsolete or rare word that’s so lovely I want to put it into general circulation. A good example is demilune, which means “half moon”, derived, of course, from “luna”, the Latin word for “moon” and “demi”, which comes from French, but was also originally derived from the Latin “dimidius”, meaning “half”.
It’s not just a beautiful word, at least to me, sounding much softer and sweeter than “half moon”, but it also reminded me that there will be a total solar eclipse on August 1st. Although it will only be visible in the upper part of the northern hemisphere it’s still a remarkable event. And for those of us who will be too far south to see it, there are still full moons, gibbous moons, crescent moons, and, of course, demilunes to keep us looking up.
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