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This week's theme Miscellaneous words This week's words otiose mendicant peremptory encomium gimcrack Follow us on Discuss Feedback RSS/XML A.Word.A.Day with Anu Garg mendicant PRONUNCIATION: (MEN-di-kuhnt) MEANING: adjective: 1. Living on alms. 2. Like a beggar. noun: 1. A beggar. 2. A member of any of various orders of friars forbidden to own property and living on alms. ETYMOLOGY: From Latin mendicare (to beg), from mendicus (beggar), from mendum (defect). USAGE: "But Metro, a perennial mendicant with no dependable dedicated, long-term source of capital funding, could hardly afford to scrap or completely rebuild the older cars." Common Sense at Metro; Washington Post; Sep 30, 2009. Explore "mendicant" in the Visual Thesaurus. A THOUGHT FOR TODAY: He who praises everybody, praises nobody. -Samuel Johnson, lexicographer (1709-1784)

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