Sunday Rest: oligomerous. Word Not To Use Today.

There are about eight point seven million different sorts of life-forms on the planet. 

Now, to describe all the bits of all these species obviously takes a lot of words, and I have long ago forgiven the biologists for coming up with such ghastly monstrosities as abdomen, urea and systole.

But still, I am mortal: there is a limit to my forgiveness, and with the word oligomerous I think the biologists may have passed it.

Oligomerous means being made up of a small number of parts. This means it would be a jolly useful word if you wanted to describe the motor of an electric car, say, or a recipe for use during a period of panic-buying.

Luckily, though, as far as I can tell, automotive engineers and writers of recipes don't know all that much about biology.

Or perhaps it's just that they, being artists, are people of greatly refined taste.

Word Not To Use Today: oligomerous. This word comes from the Greek word oligos, which means little, or few.