Word of the Day

: November 13, 2009

gust

noun GUST

What It Means

: keen delight

gust in Context

The hungry children ate every morsel with gust.

Did You Know?

You're no doubt familiar with the simple "gust" that means "a brief burst of wind." But that word, which first appeared in print in 1588, was preceded at least a century and a half earlier by a differently derived homograph. The windy "gust" is probably derived from an Old Norse word, whereas our featured word today (which is now considerably rarer than its look-alike) comes to us through Middle English from "gustus," the Latin word for "taste." "Gustus" gave English another word as well. "Gusto" (which now usually means "zest," but can also mean "an individual or specific taste") comes to us from "gustus" by way of Italian.