Word To Use Today Though Heaven Only Knows How: merchet.

Merchet is such a lovely neat sort of a word.

It's an amount of money paid by a tenant to his landlord to gain permission for the tenant's daughter to marry.


tapestry in the Metropolitan Museum of Art

Merchets haven't been paid in England (or, I hope anywhere else) for many centuries.

Sadly, this must make merchet a contender for the most useless word in the dictionary.

And it's such a lovely little word, too.

Word To Use Today Though Heaven Only Knows How: merchet. This word appeared in the 1200s from Anglo French. In those days it meant, literally, market.