Thursday, August 22, 2013

Fwd: quincunx: Dictionary.com Word of the Day

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Dictionary.com <doctor@dictionary.com>
Date: 2013/8/22
Subject: quincunx: Dictionary.com Word of the Day
To: "Hector William G." <hectorpinillos@gmail.com>

Word of the Day for Thursday, August 22, 2013

quincunx \KWING-kuhngks, KWIN-\, noun:

1. an arrangement of five objects, as trees, in a square or rectangle, one at each corner and one in the middle.
2. Botany. an overlapping arrangement of five petals or leaves, in which two are interior, two are exterior, and one is partly interior and partly exterior.

It must have been done with extraordinary taste and care, for there is not a bit of it which is not rarely beautiful. Sir Thomas Browne himself, for all his Quincunx, would have been delighted with it, and have found material for another "Garden of Cyrus."
-- Bram Stoker, The Lady of the Shroud, 1909

Light bathed the other inner flank and spilled out onto the bridge and along the wall that carried the leftway up to the gatehouse. Its face was studded with the cypher of the five-spot quincunx.
-- Ricardo Pinto, The Chosen, 1999

Quincunx comes from the Latin meaning "five twelfths." It has been part of English since the 17th century.

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