Word of the Day: tushery

tushery (n)

The use of affectedly archaic language.

"Ay, friend, a whole tale of tushery. And every tusher tushes me so free, that may I be tushed if the whole thing is worth tush."
--Robert Louis Stevenson, in a letter to his editor, W. E. Henley.

We have to wonder how this word (which Stevenson coined and which became popular enough, at least for a while, to be included in dictionaries) relates to "tush", a word that refers to, well, "the hinder", as we kids used to say. Where did the word come from? Not "your butt", as a young relative of mine would suggest. More likely, it derives from the interjection "tush", more a sound than a word, which is used to signal disapproval, as in "That blog is tush."

I find tushery rather amusing. Using archaic words, in a context that gives the listener at least some inkling of what you're blathering about, can trick people into thinking you're more educated that you really are. So memorize some Shakespeare quotations from brainyquote.com and impress your friends and enemies with your tushery erudition. Of course, not everything Shakespeare said sounds archaic today. To wit:

"A fool thinks himself to be wise, but a wise man knows himself to be a fool."