Word of the Day

: October 15, 2013

ensky

verb in-SKYE

What It Means

1 : to raise in rank, power, or character

2 : to praise highly : glorify

ensky in Context

"Since his death, he has been enskied and sainted by people who put heavy emphasis on his later, serious books…." - From Robertson Davies' 2008 book Selected Works on the Pleasures of Reading

"Hoisted up by the cranes of populist bombast to the platforms of great expectation, the newly enskied 104th Congress confronts an ancient problem in socioeconomics…." - From an essay by Lewis Lapham in Lights, Camera, Democracy!, March 27, 2001

Did You Know?

Someone who has been enskied has been raised, figuratively, as high as the sky. The "en-" prefix indicates putting something or someone into or on whatever the second part of the word indicates-in this case, the sky. Lots of words have been formed this way; some of them are quite familiar ("enthrone," "entrap"), whereas others are as high-flown as "ensky." "Enisle," for example, means "to put someone on an island," or, figuratively, "to isolate someone." "Enwomb" means "to shut one up as if in a womb." The very first, and most famous, use of "ensky" occurs in Shakespeare's Measure for Measure, when Lucio tells Isabella, a novice in a convent, "I hold you as a thing enskied and sainted."