Daily Content Archive
(as of Saturday, August 14, 2021)| Word of the Day | |||||||
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supercilious
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| Daily Grammar Lesson | |
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Forming Collective AdjectivesCollective adjectives are a subgroup of nominal adjectives, or adjectives that act as nouns. They are used to refer to a group of people based on a characteristic that they share. What article is usually added before the adjective? More... | |
| Article of the Day | |
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 OasesAn oasis is a fertile area of desert land that forms when groundwater lies close enough to the surface to form a spring or to be reached by wells, providing it with a permanent supply of fresh water. Oases vary in size from a pond with a group of date palms to the oasis cities of the deserts of Arabia. Because oases allow travelers, most importantly traders, to replenish their food and water supplies, they are of great strategic and economic value. What Nordic country has a so-called oasis? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
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 British Troops Are Deployed in Northern Ireland (1969)In August 1969, tensions between Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland came to a head in the predominantly-Catholic Bogside neighborhood of Londonderry. For days, fighting raged with Catholic residents on one side and police and Protestant residents on the other. On August 14, British troops were deployed to restore order. Some consider that day to be the definitive beginning of the decades-long conflict known as The Troubles. How did residents react to the arrival of the army? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
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 Hans Christian Ørsted (1777)Ørsted was a Danish physicist and chemist. In 1820, he discovered that electric current passing through a wire can deflect a nearby compass needle, a phenomenon that inspired the development of electromagnetic theory. His 1820 discovery of piperine, one of the pungent components of pepper, was an important contribution to chemistry. In 1824, he founded a society devoted to the spread of scientific knowledge among the general public. What unit of measurement was named after him? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
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 There is one insuperable obstacle to a belief in ghosts. A ghost never comes naked: he appears either in a winding-sheet or "in his habit as he lived." To believe in him, then, is to believe that not only have the dead the power to make themselves visible after there is nothing left of them, but that the same power inheres in textile fabrics.Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
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say again— Could you please repeat what you just said? More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
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 Pakistan Independence Day (2021)On this day in 1947, Pakistan gained independence from Britain. Pakistan had been part of the immense British colony of India since the 18th century. Independence Day is a national holiday observed in much the same way as Pakistan Day. More... | |
| Word Trivia | |
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Today's topic: trunkbillet - A civilian house where soldiers are lodged temporarily; a billet is also a thick piece of wood, from Latin billa/billus, "branch, trunk." More... trunk - As a box or chest, it was originally made from a tree trunk. More... bole - Another name for the trunk of a tree. More... stocky - A derivative of stock, which first meant "trunk, block of wood," in Old English. More... | |