Scapegrace / Lucubrations / Odium
Scapegrace, noun: an incorrigible rascal; a habitually unscrupulous person; a complete rogue.
(1763)
“In 1890 and 1891, the scapegrace Walter James Chadwick lived in Hulme, Manchester.”
Lucubration, noun: laborious or intensive study; also: the product of such study, usually used in the plural.
[Origin: Latin lucubration-, lucubratio study by night, work produced at night, from lucubrare to work by lamplight; akin to Latin luc-, lux.]
“There were some initial police lucubrations that it might not be a case of murder at all, since the drunk Annie Yates might have slipped and struck her head against the furniture; when she wanted to bandage her wound with the towel, she had passed out, and been suffocated by the towel slipping over her nose and mouth.”
(1595)
Odium, noun.
1: the state or fact of being subjected to hatred and contempt as a result of a despicable act or blameworthy circumstance.
2: hatred and condemnation accompanied by loathing or contempt: detestation.
3: disrepute or infamy attached to something: opprobrium.
[Origin: Latin, hatred, from odisse to hate; akin to Old English atol terrible, Greek odyssasthai to be angry.]
(1602)
“Two professional translators were employed to prepare French and German versions of the police placard, for insertion in the main newspapers of those countries; there was odium when the German version was found to contain a long list of linguistic lapses, and Dr. Althschul, the professional translator, had to submit a ten-page memorandum in his defence, saying that it was all just jealousy from colleagues who envied his position.”
All from Rivals of the Ripper: Unsolved Murders of Women in Late Victorian London, Jan Bondeson.
Marcus Ranum says
Lucubration
Uploading …. (complete)
Caine says
Great word, isn’t it? Lucubrations fits me to a T.
WMDKitty -- Survivor says
I love these posts! The words don’t always make it into my vocabulary, but I do always learn something.
Caine says
Thank you!