curiosity
/ˌkjʊə.ɹiˈɒs.ə.ti/
curiosity means inquisitiveness; the tendency to ask and learn about things by asking questions, investigating, or exploring. It carries an Arena rating of 1606, earned across 3 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, curiosity ranks #2,338 of 14,361 for Most Ingenious Words, #2,351 of 14,308 for Most Malleable Words, #2,356 of 14,297 for Best Fossil-Poetry Words, #5,994 of 14,297 for Words That Escaped Their Books.
curiosity is pronounced /ˌkjʊə.ɹiˈɒs.ə.ti/.
Why “curiosity” is a great word
A strong, often irresistible desire to know or learn, or the unusual object itself that first sparks that desire. From Middle English curiosite, from Anglo-Norman curiouseté, from Latin cūriōsitātem (the state of being careful or inquisitive), from cūriōsus (careful, inquisitive), with the sense of 'object of interest' attested from the 1640s. Unlike inquisitiveness, which implies a persistent, pointed interrogation, or novelty, which merely denotes newness, curiosity is the initial, generative spark—the state of eager, open interest that a novelty inspires. It is the child’s finger tracing the contours of a fossil in a drawer, the traveler’s pause before a half-open door in an unfamiliar alley, the collector’s gentle lift of a speckled stone from a riverbed. It is not the answer, but the ache to reach it; not the object, but the hush that surrounds it.
Etymology
From Middle English curiosite, variant of curiouste, from Anglo-Norman curiouseté, from Latin cūriōsitātem, accusative of cūriōsitās. By surface analysis, curious + -ity. Displaced native Old English firwitt.
noun
- Inquisitiveness; the tendency to ask and learn about things by asking questions, investigating, or exploring.“It was the first time that the lawyer had been received in that part of his friend's quarters; and he eyed the dingy windowless structure with curiosity, and gazed round with a distasteful sense of strangeness as he crossed the theatre, […]”
- A unique or extraordinary object which arouses interest.“He put the strangely shaped rock in his curiosity cabinet.”
- Careful, delicate construction; fine workmanship, delicacy of building.“wee built a homely thing like a barne, set upon Cratchets, covered with rafts, sedge, and earth, so also was the walls; the best of our houses of the like curiosity, but the most part farre much worse workmanship […]”
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