supernaculum
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English
Etymology
Pseudo-Latinism from super- + naculum, nagulum, Latinized form of German Nagel, intended to mean “upon the nail”, after the German phrase auf den Nagel (trinken).[1]
Pronunciation
Adverb
supernaculum (not comparable)
- (obsolete) According to the rules of an old drinking game in which the drinker upturned the empty cup and had to drink more if the remaining droplets spilled beyond the edge of his fingernail.
- To the last drop, to the bottom.
- 1816 December, “Fragmenta. Being Thoughts, Observations, Reflections, and Criticisms, with Anecdotes and Characters Ancient and Modern. No. XVI.”, in The European Magazine, and London Review, , volume 70, London: James Asperne, , page 508, column 1:
- A dream put Aristotle out of breath, / A meteor he said, ’twixt life and death. “An quid fit frustra? An datur vacuum? Fill the pot, Edy! Supernaculum.” A blazing star’s a rare spectaculum!
- 1822, [Walter Scott], chapter IV, in Peveril of the Peak. , volume III, Edinburgh: Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co., →OCLC, page 81:
- Nay, it shall be an overflowing bumper an you will; and I will drink it super naculum.
Noun
supernaculum (uncountable)
- (obsolete) Excellent wine that one would wish to drink to the last drop.
- 1796, George Colman the Younger, The Iron Chest, act II, scene 4:
- I've placed another flaggon on the table. Your worship knows it— number thirty-five:— the supernaculum.
- 1836, Madrid in 1835: Sketches of the Metropolis of Spain and its Inhabitants, and of Society and Manners in the Peninsula:
- Between the mattings, or dangling from the arched awning, an experienced eye may detect little pet barrels of supernaculum; some racy wine sent as a present from the correrero of Malaga, to some old friend or patron in the metropolis.
References
- ^ “supernaculum, adv., n., and int.”, in OED Online
, Oxford: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.
