esclandre means an incident that occasions much disapproving talk; scandalous conduct; a scene. It carries an Arena rating of 1386, earned across 3 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, esclandre ranks #3,372 of 17,143 for Best Fossil-Poetry Words, #4,157 of 17,132 for Most Betrayed by Its Sound, #4,418 of 17,163 for Funniest Words, #4,775 of 17,104 for Most Storied Words.
Why “esclandre” is a great word
An incident that provokes public scandal and becomes the subject of censorious gossip, from French esclandre, an alteration (with intrusive 'l') of Middle French escandre, escandle, from Ecclesiastical Latin scandalum ("stumbling block, cause of offense"), from Ancient Greek σκάνδαλον (skándalon, "trap, snare"). Unlike "scandal," which names the pervasive climate of outrage, or "fracas," which merely describes a noisy quarrel, an esclandre is the specific, crystallizing event—the flashpoint that ignites the talk. It is the smashed glass at the embassy function, the hissed accusation on the courthouse steps, the private letter read aloud in a crowded theater—a rupture in decorum so potent it immediately demands an audience, the snare that trips the unwary into the pit of collective judgment.
Etymology
French. Doublet of slander and scandal
noun
- An incident that occasions much disapproving talk; scandalous conduct; a scene.
- Infamy.
Definitions & examples from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).
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