Friday word: Sleight

[med_cat]

sleight

"Sleight of hand" is one tricky phrase. "Sleight" is often miswritten as "slight" and for good reason.

Not only does the expression convey an image of light, nimble fingers, which fits well with the smallness implied by "slight," but an alternate expression for the concept is "legerdemain," from the French léger de main," literally, "light of hand."

"Sleight" comes from a different source, a Middle English word meaning "cunning" or "trickery." It's a wily little word that lives up to its name.

Source: 12 Old Words That Survived by Getting Fossilized in Idioms, from Mental Floss

Comments

[ersatz-read.livejournal.com]

Cool. Although, you have inadvertently made more work for me: I logged in intending to do 'shrift' for the Monday word, but I see that it's one of the 12 old words in your link. I'll take that as a case of "great minds think alike" and go find another word.

[med_cat]

Ah, sorry about that; although you could've still used "shrift" ;)

[prettygoodword.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure I almost always misspell this as slight. :-(

[med_cat]

A common error, I think :)