Some 16th-century Italian clergymen tried to ban coffee because they believed it to be “satanic.” However, Pope Clement VII loved coffee so much that he lifted the ban and had coffee baptized in 1600.
TORTURING
agonizing, agonising, excruciating, harrowing, torturing, torturous, torturesome
(adjective) extremely painful
torture, torturing
(noun) the deliberate, systematic, or wanton infliction of physical or mental suffering by one or more persons in an attempt to force another person to yield information or to make a confession or for any other reason; “it required unnatural torturing to extract a confession”
Source: WordNet® 3.1
Noun
torturing (countable and uncountable, plural torturings)
An act of torture
Verb
torturing
present participle of torture
Source: Wiktionary
TORTURE
Tor"ture, n. Etym: [F.,fr.L. tortura, fr. torquere, tortum, to twist, rack, torture; probably akin to Gr. tre`pein to turn, G. drechsein to turn on a lathe, and perhaps to E. queer. Cf. Contort, Distort, Extort, Retort, Tart, n., Torch, Torment, Tortion, Tort, Trope.]
1. Extreme pain; anguish of body or mind; pang; agony; torment; as, torture of mind. Shak. Ghastly spasm or racking torture. Milton.
2. Especially, severe pain inflicted judicially, either as punishment for a crime, or for the purpose of extorting a confession from an accused person, as by water or fire, by the boot or thumbkin, or by the rack or wheel.
3. The act or process of torturing. Torture, whitch had always been deciared illegal, and which had recently been declared illegal even by the servile judges of that age, was inflicted for the last time in England in the month of May, 1640. Macaulay.
Tor"ture, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Tortured (; p. pr. & vb. n. Torturing.] Etym: [Cf. F. Torturer. ]
1. To put to torture; to pain extremely; to harass; to vex.
2. To punish with torture; to put to the rack; as, to torture an accused person. Shak.
3. To wrest from the proper meaning; to distort. Jar. Taylor.
4. To keep on the stretch, as a bow. [Obs.] The bow tortureth the string. Bacon.
Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition
Recent Word Finds
Word of the Day
26 June 2024
INCORPORATE
(verb) include or contain; have as a component; “A totally new idea is comprised in this paper”; “The record contains many old songs from the 1930’s”
Coffee Trivia
