Daily Content Archive
(as of Friday, July 10, 2020)| Word of the Day | |||||||
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torturous
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| Daily Grammar Lesson | |
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SlashesThe slash ( / )—technically known as a virgule but also called a slant, solidus, or stroke—serves a number of purposes in writing. What are they? More... | |
| Article of the Day | |
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 ManiMani was the Iranian founder of Manichaeism, a once-widespread but now-extinct religion that centered on the struggle between good and evil. Inspired by visions of an angel, Mani saw himself as the last in a line of prophets that included Adam, Buddha, Zoroaster, and Jesus. His preaching was tolerated until Persian king Bahram I’s reign in the late 3rd century, during which time Mani was imprisoned. Though little is reliably known about his life, by many accounts he died in what gruesome way? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
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 Rubens's Massacre of the Innocents Sells for £49.5 million (2002)Misattributed to an assistant of Baroque painter Peter Paul Rubens until 2002, when an expert from Sotheby's auction house identified it as the work of the master himself, Massacre of the Innocents is an early 17th-century painting depicting Herod's slaughter of the infants of Bethlehem. One of two paintings Rubens made of the Biblical scene, it fetched £49.5 million ($76 million) at auction and is one of the priciest paintings ever sold. Its style is reminiscent of which Italian painter? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
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 Marcel Proust (1871)One of the great literary figures of the modern age, Proust was a French author who is best known for À la recherche du temps perdu, his 3,200-page masterpiece. After the death of his mother, the asthmatic Proust increasingly withdrew to eccentric seclusion, where he wrote his multivolume, semiautobiographical work. The discursive novel explores issues of human psychology, time, memory, and desire, but Proust died before completing it. What is the English translation of his novel's title? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
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 The gambling known as business looks with austere disfavor upon the business known as gambling.Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
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long-run— (used before a noun) Involving, maturing after, or lasting for a long period of time. More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
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 Bahamas Independence Day (2021)The Bahama Islands gained independence from Great Britain at 12:01 a.m. on this day in 1973. The islands had been a British colony for nearly 250 years, but are now a commonwealth, with their own prime minister and parliament. Businesses are closed on the tenth, a legal holiday, but festivities go on for a week with parades and celebrations. A fireworks display at Clifford Park in Nassau on July 10 tops off the celebrations. More... | |
| Word Trivia | |
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Today's topic: providedub - Meaning "to provide a film with a soundtrack," it is an abbreviation of "double." More... endow - First meant "provide a dower or dowry." More... refurbish, refurnish, redecorate, renovate - Refurbish means to "clean up again," refurnish means "to provide with new furnishings," redecorate means "to add new decoration(s)," and renovate means "renew or restore to as-new condition." More... improvise - Etymologically, if you improvise something, it is because it has not been "provided" for in advance, from Latin improvisus, "unforeseen." More... | |