Today's Word "Dudgeon"
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Published in Vocabulary
dudgeon \DEH-jehn\ (noun) - No, today's word has nothing to do with subterranean jails but rather the mood of someone leaving one: angry, indignant humor, resentfulness. At one time it also referred to the wood of the boxwood tree, a material favored for the handles of knives and daggers because of curly grain, unlikely to splinter, hence dudgeon-daggers.
"I hope it will not put you in a dudgeon if I tell you that your purse doesn't match our dress."
By apheresis from the original form endugine, which may (or may not) have come from Welsh dygen "malice, resentment" with an enhancing prefix en- added for what reason no one knows. If so, it would be related to Cornish duehah, duwhan, "grief, sorrow."
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