Friday, April 18, 2014

Word of the Day -- Oubliette

An oubliette is a dungeon with an opening only at the top.  I tried to find out a little bit more about the word as it is very interesting to me, but all I could really find is the etymology, which makes sense after reading it:

French, from Middle French, from oublier to forget, from Old French oblier, from Vulgar Latin *oblitare, frequentative of Latin oblivisci to forget


1 comment:

Steve Blunden said...

These prisons were notorious. They were called an Oubliette because they were used to put prisoners in, who would then be left without food or water, left to die, and 'forgotten' about. A bit like the way an oppressive regime of more modern times 'disappear' political dissidents.

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