They're usually small. And young. And beautiful.
They increasingly come packed into cars, but a playground
or a first school:
should contain several.
Yes, that's right, an abecedarian is someone who's learning their alphabet.
If your devout wish is to avoid children under all circumstances, then an abecedarian can also mean someone who's just beginning to learn any subject.
Which could so easily be you, couldn't it.
However, if you are determined never to learn anything new ever again, then as an adjective abecedarian can describe anything arranged in alphabetical order.
The Word Den is most proudly not the slightest bit acebedarian, but Eddie's terrific blog Lexicolatry, which can be found HERE is.
It's funny, too: well worth a look.
Spot the Frippet: abecedarian. There was a late Latin word abecedarius, derived from, obviously, the letters a,b,c,d.
Aww! Thanks for bigging up Lexicolatry, Sally!
ReplyDeleteI actually covered the word abecedarian waaaay back in the beginnings of my blog, and it was funny because at that time I had just started learning Romanian, and was at the stage of learning the Romanian alphabet when I covered it; thus, I was (quite literally) an abecedarian myself : o )
A pleasure, Eddie: may Lexicolatry live long and prosper!
DeleteI can't claim to be learning a new language, though I've just learned my first word of Kazakh. Unfortunately it starts with a s - soz, meaning word - but it should still count, shouldn't it.