Wordsmith.org: the magic of words


A.Word.A.Day

About | Media | Search | Contact  


Home

Today's Word

Subscribe

Archives



Aug 12, 2022
This week’s theme
Words coined after animals

This week’s words
cynical
lemming
serpentine
jackrabbit
chevachee

chevachee
Jalal ad-Din Khwarazmshah crossing the rapid Indus River, escaping Genghis Khan and his army
Painting from History of Abul-Khayr Khan by Mas’ud bin Osmani Kuhistani, 1540s

This week’s comments
AWADmail 1050

Next week’s theme
Words that aren't what they appear to be
Bookmark and Share Facebook Twitter Digg MySpace Bookmark and Share
A.Word.A.Day
with Anu Garg

chevachee

PRONUNCIATION:
(shuh-vuh-CHEE/SHAY)

MEANING:
noun: An expedition, raid, or campaign.

ETYMOLOGY:
From French chevauchée (ride), from cheval (horse), from Latin caballus (horse). Earliest documented use: 1380.

USAGE:
“Nicolas Sarkozy, the French President, brings a secret weapon with him today. It, or rather she, is his mother-in-law. ... This makes it a unique chevachee in the long history of Anglo-French ententes cordiales and not so cordiales.”
Blair Force One; The Times (London, UK); Feb 16, 2002.

“The word chevachee is the most apt way of describing the Mongol raiding tactics in 1211, for it is an act of plundering on a relentless and extensive scale.”
James Waterson; Defending Heaven; Pen & Sword Books; 2013.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:
I hate with a murderous hatred those men who, having lived their youth, would send into war other youth, not lived, unfulfilled, to fight and die for them; the pride and cowardice of those old men, making their wars that boys must die. -Mary Roberts Rinehart, novelist (12 Aug 1876-1958)

We need your help

Help us continue to spread the magic of words to readers everywhere

Donate

Subscriber Services
Awards | Stats | Links | Privacy Policy
Contribute | Advertise

© 1994-2024 Wordsmith