Whicken, Quicken, the Breard from the Earth

You’re listening to A Way with Words, the show about language and how we use it.

I’m Grant Barrett.

And I’m Martha Barnette.

And Grant, I have a couple of uplifting and energizing words for you.

Oh, yes, please.

The words are Wiccan and Brared.

Where did you meet those accountants?

Oh, that’s right.

I got to do my taxes.

Wiccan and Brared.

Yeah, wiccan is a verb, and it refers to the lengthening of days in the spring.

So the days wiccan.

The days wiccan.

They grow longer.

They wax.

Yes, exactly.

And wiccan is a variant of quicken, you know, to come to life.

And that’s been around since the 19th century.

And braird, I guess that would be B-R-A-I-R-D, something like that?

Brared is spelled B-R-E-A-R-D, Brared.

And Brared refers to the first shoots of a plant visible above the earth.

Oh, how lovely.

Isn’t it?

So you would say, I spy the Brared of the seeds we planted last week.

That’s beautiful.

Yes, yes.

Literally or metaphorically.

Oh, so you could say the Brared of our ideas appeared as we began to work hard towards our goals.

Oh, I like that. I like that sort of bubbling to the surface. Yeah, both of those words,

Brayard and Wiccan, I found in a book called A Winter Dictionary. It’s by Paul Anthony Jones.

And it’s this lovely browsing book that’s mostly about words involving winter, but it also includes

Some bright springy ones like that. And you may remember, Grant, that Jones has also been helping

Popularized the word

Respire, which back in the

16th century was used as

A noun to mean the return of hope

After a period of despair,

Or as a verb, respire

Means to have hope again.

And for some reason, this word became

Obsolete, but it sure seems worth

Reviving. Yeah, Paul Anthony Jones

Has great social media presence

And a bunch of fun books. We’ll link to

At least one of them, maybe more, on our

Website at waywordradio.org.

You can call us or text us to our toll-free number at 877-929-9673.