| abstruse |
difficult to comprehend or understand; esoteric; arcane. |
| amortize |
to deduct (expenditures) by fixed amounts over a period of time. |
| bathos |
a sudden descent from an exalted style or esteemed state to the commonplace. |
| dearth |
a shortage or scarcity of something; lack. |
| deify |
to raise to the rank of a god; consider to be a god. |
| fealty |
faithfulness or loyalty. |
| harbinger |
someone or something that signals or foreshadows a later arrival or occurrence; herald; forerunner. |
| idiosyncrasy |
a characteristic of temperament, habit, or physical structure particular to a given individual or group; peculiarity. |
| intelligentsia |
the elite class of highly learned people within a society, or those who consider themselves part of such a class. |
| louche |
of questionable decency, morality, or taste; shady; disreputable. |
| malapropism |
the humorous or ridiculous misuse of a word, especially by using a word that sounds similar to the correct word, but whose meaning is inappropriate. |
| maunder |
to speak in an aimless or foolish way; babble. |
| obscurantism |
a deliberate lack of clarity or directness of expression, as in certain styles of art or literature. |
| splenetic |
ill-tempered or spiteful. |
| vouchsafe |
to grant or give with condescension or as a special favor. |