xerophagy means A restrictive diet (of bread and water, for example) as a punishment or religious form of discipline. Lexicurio rates it Sui generis — a strength score of 92 out of 100.
xerophagy is pronounced /zɪəˈɹɒfədʒi/.
Why “xerophagy” is a great word
XEROPHAGY — [Noun] A restrictive diet, especially one of dry or plain food such as bread and water, undertaken as a form of religious fasting or ascetic discipline. From the Late Latin xerophagia, from the Ancient Greek ξηροφαγία (xērophagía), from ξηρός (xērós, "dry") and φαγεῖν (phageîn, "to eat"). Unlike "fasting" (a general abstention from sustenance) or "abstinence" (a refraining from specific luxuries), xerophagy is a prescriptive, ritualized consumption of aridity. It is the penitential heft of a stale crust, the audible scrape of its passage down a dry throat, and the faint scent of flour and dust rising from a bare wooden board—a voluntary embrace of the texture of want, making the body a dry cistern to better hear the echo of the spirit.
noun
- A restrictive diet (of bread and water, for example) as a punishment or religious form of discipline.