HOW TO USE THE DICTIONARY
Learn what the dictionary tells you about words.
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The Usage Panel is a group of nearly 200 prominent scholars, creative writers, journalists, diplomats, and others in occupations requiring mastery of language. The Panelists are surveyed annually to gauge the acceptability of particular usages and grammatical constructions.
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INDO-EUROPEAN & SEMITIC ROOTS APPENDICES
Thousands of entries in the dictionary include etymologies that trace their origins back to reconstructed proto-languages. You can obtain more information about these forms in our online appendices:
The Indo-European appendix covers nearly half of the Indo-European roots that have left their mark on English words. A more complete treatment of Indo-European roots and the English words derived from them is available in our Dictionary of Indo-European Roots.
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adj. Arranged in regular rows, as the spots on the wings of an insect. n. Symbol y The plane Cartesian coordinate representing the distance from a specified point to the x-axis, measured parallel to the y-axis. [Middle English, properly ordered, from Latin ōrdinātus, past participle of ōrdināre, to set in order, from ōrdō, ōrdin-, order; see ar- in the Appendix of Indo-European roots.] |
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition copyright ©2018 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
