exenterate and exanimate and exergue and exedra and embowel and eximious and evzne

1. Eximious. When the Puritans began to publish their voluminous sermons and theological treatises in the 17th century, they bequeathed to the English language not only a peculiar Scripture-centered piety that has been rediscovered by many in our day, but they discovered (or invented) lots of words to capture the fullness and transformative power of the Gospel that they preached. We begin today with one of their words, eximious, used by the greats such as John Owen and John Flavel, and meaning "excellent, distinguished, or eminent." Granted, the OED says that it was a common term in 17th century literature which assumed a rather pedantic meaning in the 19th (see the discussion of esurient in a previous essay), but I was impressed through some quick internet searches of the way it is used in connection with the "eximious way of the Cross" or "eximious expression of love" by the Puritan preachers. "Our Savior Christ, was unquestionably, that One Eximious Prophet, which God..promised to send." Or, "Is not this part of the prophecy eximiously fulfilled?"

The American Puritan preacher Jonathan Edwards entitled one of his famous sermons, "The Excellency of Jesus Christ." Had he lived a century earlier he might have called it "The Eximious Grace of Christ" or something to that effect. The word has fallen out of use; I think we can recapture it to describe an "eximious performance" or and "eximious choice." It would be a special word to describe something clearly superior to any other thing that might have been chosen.

2. These next few words aren't "ex" words, but they should be mentioned. Euonymus is the spindle tree, but how it got its name, as the OED conjectures, is interesting. "Pliny (author of the multi-volume Natural History) says that the flowering of the euonymus was a presage of pestilence; hence it seems probably that the name 'lucky' was given with euphemistic intention." Euonymous (with the "o") means "well-named" or "lucky," and so the comment is clear. So, we could say, as the OED does, "The Peace Society, and its euonymous president, Mr. Pease." There is, however, no word in English for "unluckily named." We could make one up: dysonymous. Thus, we could say that the dysonymous president of the dentist's association was Dr. Payne. One other word, not in the Collegiate, is eupathy. It means "a happy condition of the soul" and is derived from Stoic philosophy. As one 19th century writer remarked, "The Stoics who called our good affections eupathies, did not manage those affections as well as they understoond them." "Such a eupathetic child!"

An evzone is "a member of a select infantry regiiment in the Greek army, originally recruited from the Greek highlands and conspicuous for their uniform which includes a fustanella." The OED does not have the word fustanella, but a quick internet search not only revealed the word (an "unbifurcated" white skirt, worn by Albanian and Greek soldiers and used in ceremonial and military contexts) but gave some pictures of fustanella-clad guys. Once you get into skirts for men you run into lots of interesting web pages on skirts/kilts.

3. Let's get back to a few "Ex's." The words that interest me are exanimate, exonumia, exenterate, exedra and exergue. Exonumia are "objects of historical interest which lie outside the field of numismatics but which relate to or resemble coins or currency, such as medals, tokens, badges, coupons, etc." Coined by Californian collector Russell Rulau in 1960, by 1965 the word was accepted by Webster's. There is now a thriving market for exonumia. The combination of growth in technology (i.e., "EBay") as well as the proliferation of tokens or memorabilia that have no intrinsic value in themselvs but may gain value because the event or person they commemorate has become noteworthy, has led to a thriving market in exonumia. More than one web site says the word paranumismatics is the English equivalent of the (American-coined) exonumia. Yet it is ironic that the British-published OED, the bastion of correct English, has no mention of paranumasmatics.

An exergue is a place on a coin, specifically on the reverse, where the place where the coin was struck or the emblem or signature of the artist is imprinted. The Century has pictures of the obverse (where there is a face) and reverse of coins, and it shows the reverse divided into the three parts of the legend (the statement or words running in a semicircle around the outside border), the inscription (the picture or "action" in the middle of the coin) and the exergue or basis at the base.

The word exedra can refer to two things. Derived from the Greek meaning an "outside chair," the original signification was of a raised platform with steps in the open air, often by a roadside or other public place, which provided the seats for people to engage in repose and conversation. But a secondary definition, which is now the more common in archaeological definitions, is a semicircular recess, headed by a half-dome, which is usually set into a building's facade. It may also be a curved break in a colonnade.

Finishing Up

Let's conclude with two terms that don't have a specific historical connotation: exenterate and exanimate. I like the latter because it can be so easily used, and no one will know what you mean. But that isn't your fault. They have the same opportunity to learn the language as you do. It can mean to be deprived of life (like inaninmate," but it also suggests "deprived or destitute of animation or courage; spiritless." A quotation illustrating the first is: "Thither, almost exanimate from fright...was he conveyed." A quotation showing the more figurative meaning is: "The comparatively exanimate productions of 100 moralists." One could expand on the latter to emphasize the exanimate nature of many college lectures, the examinate faith of people, the examinate interest in repeating the same task that you have performed hundreds of times, etc.

Finally, the word exenterate, used as a verb, means to take out the "entera" or the "bowels." To exenterate means to disembowel or to eviscerate. But its figurative usage is most interesting. "Summon the world, exenterate old stories." One could speak of rapacious individuals by using the word: "They unlawfully exenterate and eate out the bowels of poore mens purses..." I suppose one could exenterate the meaning of a text, but perhaps the word enucleate captures better what you are trying to do. I like John Donne's use of the term. You would think that because of his religious position that he would have found a way to bring the word into theology, but he can say, "Such bodies as were exenterated and embowelled and then..plastered about with spices and gums." Notice that embowelled in the 17th century means the same as disemboweled, which arises only in that century. Careful reading of the words, then, gives you not only a field of meaning but alerts you to the way that the words have developed historically.

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