The Facts on File Dictionary of Foreign Words and Phrases (Writers Reference) (25 page)

Diwali (dawahlee), Divali (dbvahlee)
HINDI [from Sanskrit diparali row of
lights] noun the Hindu and Sikh festival of lights, held in October and
November.

dixit (diksit) LATIN [he has spoken]
verb referring to a statement already
made.

djellaba See JELLAIIA.

djinn See JINNI.

do. See DITTO.

doch-an-dorris (dok an Boris), deoch
an doris SCOTTISH GAELIC [drink of
the door] noun a parting drink.

doctrinaire (doktranair) FRENCH
[pedantic, illiberal, from doctrine
doctrine] adjective dogmatic, dictatorial. -noun a person who holds
strict views or adheres to a particular theory or doctrine, regardless of
practical considerations: "Who wants
to be consistent? The dullard and the doctrinaire, the tedious people who carry out
their principles to the bitter end of action, to the reductio ad absurdum of practice."
(Oscar Wilde, Intentions, 1891).

dogma (dogma) GREEK [dokein to
seem] noun (plural dogmas, dogmaz,
or dogmata, dogmahta) an established opinion, prescribed doctrine,
or code of belief: "Stooping over, he
kissed on the fair cheek his fellow-man, a
felon in martial law, one who though on
the confines of death he felt he could never
convert to a dogma; nor for all that did he
fear for his future." (Herman Melville,
Billy Budd, 1924).

dojo (dojo) JAPANESE [from do way
and jo place] noun a place for
training in Japanese martial arts, such
as judo and karate: My karate instructor
opened his first dojo in Tokyo in 1990."

dolce (dolchay) ITALIAN [sweet] adjective soft, smooth. adverb in music,
to be played in a soft or smooth
manner.

dolce vita (dolchi veeta) ITALIAN [sweet
life] noun phrase the soft life, a life of
self-indulgence and luxury: "In his
mind's eye he saw himself in a villa overlooking the sea, cocktail in hand, living
the dolce vita."

dolma (dolma) TURKISH [filling] noun
(plural dolmas or dolmades, dolmahdeez) (in Greek and Turkish cuisine) a
vine or cabbage leaf stuffed with meat
and rice.

dolmen (dolman) FRENCH [from Breton to] table and men stone] noun a
megalithic monument consisting of a
huge stone slab supported by two or
more stone pillars, often built originally as a burial chamber: "Again, M.
Dupont found thirty per cent of perforated
bones in the caves of the Valley of the Lesse,
belonging to the Reindeer period; whilst M.
Leguay, in a sort of dolmen at Argenteuil,
observed twenty-five per cent to be perforated; and M. Pruner-Bey found twenty-six
per cent in the same condition in bones from
Vaureal." (Charles Darwin, The Descent
of Man, 1871). See also CROMLECH.

doloroso (dolaroso) ITALIAN [painful]
adjective in music, plaintive, soft,
and pathetic.

domicile (domasil,domasil) FRENCH
[home, from Latin domus home] noun
a formal word for a home or residence: "Military families tend to have
frequent changes of domicile."

dominatrix (domipytriks) LATIN [she
who dominates, feminine of dominator he who dominates] noun (plural
dominatrices, domiptriseez) a
woman who dominates her partner in
sadomasochistic sex, or more generally a woman who is domineering in
character.

domino (domino) SPANISH [from Latin
dominus master] noun (plural dominos
or dominoes) a long hooded cloak, often with half mask, as worn at costume parties and masquerades: "What
does your blockhead father when he and
Mrs. Rudge have laid their heads together,
but goes there when he ought to be abed,
makes interest with his friend the doorkeeper, slips him on a mask and domino,
and mixes with the masquers." (Charles
Dickens, Barnaby Rudge, 1841). Also,
a small rectangular block, divided
into halves, with zero to six dots in
each half, used in the game of dominoes.

Dominus vobiscum (dominas vobiskam) LATIN [the Lord with you] noun
phrase May the Lord be with you.

don (don) SPANISH [from Latin dominus
master] noun a Spanish nobleman
or gentleman. Also used as a title for
university professors in Britain and
more widely applied to any person of
consequence, including high-ranking
members of the Mafia: "The dons who
rule the waterfront would never allow such
interference from the unions in their murky
affairs."

doner kebab (doner kabab, donar
kabab) TURKISH [rotating kebab]
noun phrase a Turkish dish comprising
slices of meat cut from a large piece of
lamb roasted on a rotating spit.

Don Juan (don wahn, don .an)
SPANISH [after the legendary Spanish nobleman and rake Don Juan]
noun a good-looking man who has a

reputation as a libertine and seducer
of women: "Tales of his many sexual conquests appeared to confirm his reputaton as
the Don Juan of the district."

donnee (dony) FRENCH [given, feminine past participial adjective of donner to give] noun a given fact or
basic assumption.

doppelganger (dopalgangar), doppelganger GERMAN [double-goer,
from doppel double and ganger goer]
noun a person's spectral double,
also sometimes applied to a person
who is strikingly similar in appearance
to another individual: "The stranger was
so similar in appearance to the king that
he might have been his doppelganger."

do-si-do (do see (1o), do-se-do
FRENCH [from dos-6-dos back-to-back]
noun a square dance sequence in
which partners circle one another
back-to-back.

dossier (dosyay, doseeay) FRENCH
[bundle of documents, from dos hack]
noun a file of papers relating to a
particular subject: "The police officer
looked through a whole dossier of evidence
about the crimes."

double entendre (doobla ontondra)
FRENCH [double meaning] noun phrase
(plural double entendres) a word
or phrase that can be interpreted as
having more than one meaning, one of which is usually risque in nature:
"This was greeted with an irreverent laugh,
and theyouth blushed deeply, and tried to
look as if he had meant to insinuate what
knowing people called a `double entendre"'
(Edith Wharton, The Age of Innocence,
1920).

douche (doosh) FRENCH [from Italian doccia, from doccia water pipe]
noun a jet of water or a device for
producing a jet of water: He fixed a
pail of water up in a tree, with a bit of
ribbon fastened to the handle, and when
Daisy, attracted by the gay streamer, tried
to pull it down, she got a douche bath that
spoiled her clean frock and hurt her little
feelings very much" (Louisa May Alcott,
Little Men, 1871). ' verb to direct a jet
of water at something.

dow See DHOW.

doyen (doibn, dwayen) FRENCH [from
Latin decanus dean, oldest member]
noun a person with expert knowledge or unrivaled experience in a
particular field and thus considered
senior to others in the same group or
category of people. noun, feminine
doyenne (doien, dwan) a woman
with particular knowledge or experience of a subject: "... the doyenne of the
talk show."

draconian (drakoneean), Draconian
GREEK [after the authoritarian Athenian lawgiver Drakon, or Draco]
adjective severe, harsh, cruel: "Will the courts ever stop issuing draconian punishments for such petty crimes?"

dragee (drazh) FRENCH [from Old
French dragie, possibly from Latin
tragemata sweetmeats] noun a sugarcoated nut or sweet with a hard sugar
coating; also applied to sugar-coated
pills containing drugs or medicine.

dramatis personae (dramatis personee, dramatis person) LATIN (characters of a drama] noun phrase the cast
of a play or other public performance,
or the characters in a novel, poem, or
drama; also used more widely of the
participants involved in any particular
event: "I am afraid we should get a good
deal confused even in reading our Shakespeare if we did not look back now and then
at the dramatis personae" (Oliver Wendell Holmes, Over the Teacups, 1891).

dramaturge (drambterj), dramaturg
(drambterg) GREEK [dramatourgos
drama worker] noun a dramatist, a
person with skills and experience of
theatrical writing and techniques.

dreck (drek) YIDDISH [from drek
excrement, from German Dreck filth]
noun (slang) trash, especially shoddy
merchandise: "That store sells a load of
old dreck!"

dressage (drasahzh, dresj) FRENCH
[dressing, preparing, from dresser to
train] noun the practice of training
horses to perform drill movements with minimal guidance by the rider, or
a competition in which such skills are
displayed and tested: "The team came
away with gold medals in the showjumping
and dressage events."

droit (droit, drwah) FRENCH [right,
from neuter of Latin directus just,
straight] noun a legal right or claim,
or the law in general.

droit du seigneur (drwah due saynyoor), droit de seigneur FRENCH
[right of the lord] noun phrase the
supposed right of a feudal lord to
claim the virginity of his vassal's
bride on her wedding night: "She
was a commoner, and had been sent here
on her bridal night by Sir Breuse Sance
Pite, a neighboring lord whose vassal her
father was, and to which said lord she
had refused what has since been called
le droit du seigneur, and, moreover, had
opposed violence to violence and spilt
half a gill of his almost sacred blood."
(Mark Twain, A Connecticut Yankee,
1889).

D.S. See DAL SEGNO.

duce (doochay), Duce ITALIAN [leader,
title borne by Fascist dictator Benito
Mussolini (1883-1945), from Latin
dux leader] noun leader (generally
used derogatively). See also Ff1HRER.

duenna (dooena, dyoo h) SPANISH
[governess, from Latin domina mistress] noun a Spanish or Portuguese

governess, usually a woman of mature
years who traditionally acted as chaperon to younger unmarried women:
"Well; what do you think my senior duenna
did the female one, I mean? She took
my own carriage, and posted off after Mr.
Palliser as hard as ever she could, leaving
the male duenna on the watch." (Anthony
Trollope, CanYou Forgive Her?, 1864).

duffle (dafal), duffel DUTCH [after
the town of Duffel, Belgium] noun a
coarse woolen material used for
making bags, coats, and other items
-adjective of or relating to garments
made of such material: "The captain
arrived on the bridge in a blue duffle coat
and steel helmet."

dulce et decorum est (dalchay et
dekoram est) LATIN [abbreviated
form of dulce et decorum est pro patria
mori it is sweet and fitting to die for
one's country, from the Odes of the
Greek poet Horace (65-8 B.C.)] noun
phrase it is right and proper to die
for one's own country: "Sacred to the
memory of George Osborne, Junior, Esq.,
late a Captain in his Majesty's the
regiment of foot, who fell on the 18th of
June, 1815, aged 28 years, while fighting
for his king and country in the glorious
victory of Waterloo. Dulce et decorum est
pro patria mori." (William Makepeace
Thackeray, Vanity Fair, 1847-48).

duma (dooma), douma RUSSIAN
[council] noun the lower house of
the postcommunist Russian legislature (formerly the national legislature in
prerevolutionary Russia).

dumdum (damdam), dum dum HINDI
[after the arsenal in the town of Dum
Dum, near Calcutta, India] noun a type
of hollow-nosed bullet that expands
explosively on hitting its target, with
devastating effect: "The dumdum bullets
used by the rebels inflicted serious wounds
upon government troops."

dummkopf (damkopf) GERMAN [dumb
head, from dumm stupid and Kopf
head] noun a blockhead, stupid person, idiot.

dungarees (dungareez) HINDI [from
dugril plural noun a set of working coveralls made from coarse hardwearing denim fabric: `Most of the workers wear dungarees and broad-brimmed
hats when toiling in the fields."

duomo (dwomO) ITALIAN [dome, from
Latin domus house] noun (plural duomos or duomi, dwomee) an Italian
cathedral: "Even in our own day a Milanese merchant could leave five hundred
thousand francs to the Duomo, to regild
the colossal statue of the Virgin that crowns
the edfice" (Honore de Balzac, Cousin
Bette, 1846).

duplex (doopleks) LATIN [twofold]
noun an apartment with rooms on
two floors, or otherwise divided into
two separate parts: `His brother lives in
a luxurious duplex with commanding views
of the city." -adjective twofold, double,
having two parts.

durbar (derbahr) HINDI [from darbar
court, from Persian dar door and bar
audience] noun a formal reception or
court held in the presence of royalty:
"The ambassador presented his new attache
to the prince at a durbar the following
week."

duvet (d(y)oo , d(V)oovay) FRENCH
[down] noun a thick quilt used as a
bed covering instead of blankets and
sheets: "She pulled the duvet up over her
head and told him she intended to stay in
bed all day."

D.V. See DEO VOLENTE.

dybbulc (dib3k), dibbuk YIDDISH
[from Hebrew dibbuq ghost, from
dabaq to cling] noun (plural dybbuks,
dibbuks, dybbukim or dibukkim,
dibakeem) in Jewish mythology,
a malevolent wandering spirit that
seeks to possess living mortals and
can only be driven out by exorcism.