truant: Dictionary.com Word of the Day

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	Word of the Day for Wednesday, March 13, 2013 truant \TROO-uhnt\, noun: 1. a person who shirks or neglects his or her duty. 2. a student who stays away from school without permission. adjective: 1. absent from school without permission. 2. neglectful of duty or responsibility; idle. 3. of, pertaining to, or characteristic of a truant. verb: 1. to be truant. Ozcma hath no hold on my heart, in the way thou fanciest — never had, beyond a passing and truant inclination. -- James Fenimore Cooper, Mercedes of Castile, 1861 He thought of his coming trip to Spain, and then, catching sight of her looking out towards the town and ocean, bit the truant thought back. -- Pico Iyer, Abandon, 2007 Truant comes to English from the Old French word of the same spelling meaning "beggar" or "rogue." The noun form of truant entered English in the late 1200s, though it was not until the 1500s that English speakers started using this term as an adjective. Read the full entry | See synonyms | Comment on today's word | Suggest tomorrow's word Yesterday's word | Previous words | Help Words of the Day? How about words of timeless wisdom? Introducing our Quotes channel! "Life itself is a quotation." - Jorge Luis Borges Check out the Quote of the Day ›› Lexical Investigations: Awkward A motley combination of Anglo-Saxon, Latin, and Germanic dialects, the English language (more or less as we know it) coalesced between the 9th and 13th centuries. Since then, it has continued to import and borrow words and expressions from around the world, and the meanings have mutated. (Awesome and awful once meant nearly the... Read more ›› Dictionary.com Word of the Day You are subscribed to the Word of the Day as: e-dict...@googlegroups.com Subscriber since: January 06, 2008 Unsubscribe from the Word of the Day To subscribe to the Word of the Day by email, please send a blank message to: join-wor...@lists.lexico.com ©2013 by Dictionary.com, LLC. 555 12th Street Suite 500 Oakland CA 94607 Subscriptions to the Word of the Day can also be managed online   Tell a friend about the Word of the Day!