Word of the Day:

March 9, 2016

rankle

verb RANK-ul

What it Means

1 : to cause anger, irritation, or deep bitterness in

2 : to feel anger and irritation

Rankle in Context

The ongoing roadwork has begun to rankle local owners who worry that the closed-off streets are hurting their businesses.

"That goal should sit well with many neighborhood residents—but it might rankle some landlords." — Avery Wilks and Sarah Ellis, The State (Columbia, South Carolina), 26 Sept. 2015

More example sentences

Did You Know?

The history of today's word is something of a sore subject. When rankle was first used in English, it meant "to fester," and that meaning is linked to the word's Old French ancestor—the noun raoncle or draoncle, which meant "festering sore." Etymologists think this Old French word was derived from the Latin dracunculus, a diminutive form of draco, which means "serpent" and which is the source of the English word dragon. The transition from serpents to sores apparently occurred because people thought certain ulcers or tumors looked like small serpents.

Test Your Memory

Fill in the blank in the following sentence with the Spanish borrowing that was the February 7th Word of the Day: "Mark's thank-you note to his hostess was sincere and touching; his only __________ was addressing her by her first name instead of 'Mrs. Henderson.'"

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