Word of the Day

: August 14, 2015

quaggy

adjective KWAG-ee

What It Means

1 : marshy or boggy

2 : flabby or soft

quaggy in Context

"Today is the opening of 'Expedition Alaska: Dinosaurs,' the latest installation at the museum chronicling the reptilian behemoths-and even the little ones, too-that once spanned the state from the frozen North Slope to the quaggy Southeast." - Gary Black, Newsminer.com (Fairbanks, Alaska), May 23, 2015

"Life is a never-ending succession of tasks, some with quaggy deadlines, others with strict ones." - Hayley Mortimer, Gloucestershire Echo, June 6, 2015

Did You Know?

Quaggy is related to quag, a word for a marsh or bog, and quagmire-which can refer to wet, spongy land that gives way underfoot or, figuratively, to a predicament. Etymologists claim no firm footing when it comes to the origin of the syllable the words share in common, though it's been suggested that quag is imitative, echoing the soft, mushy sound that wet ground makes when you walk on it. The words are all roughly the same age, with earliest evidence of quagmire, quag, and quaggy dating to 1566, 1589, and 1596, respectively.