Word of the Day

: April 5, 2008

spinous

adjective SPY-nuss

What It Means

1 a : covered or armed with spines; broadly : bearing spines, prickles, or thorns

b : slender and pointed like a spine

2 : difficult or unpleasant to handle or meet : thorny

spinous in Context

Both Kate and Nelson were uncomfortable answering the spinous, prying questions asked by their marriage counselor.

Did You Know?

English writers have been associating spines with things that are difficult to take since at least 1586, when the English dramatist Thomas Kyd used the word "spiny" to describe his "cares." "Spinous" took on its figurative use in 1638, when the phrase "spinous criticisms" appeared. "Thorny explications" followed shortly after that, in 1653. Emily Dickinson gets the credit for giving the word "prickly" its "troublesome" sense. In her 1862 poem that begins "The Child's faith is new," she wrote, "To hold mistaken / His pretty estimates / Of Prickly Things."