| A | B |
|---|
| abeyance | a temporary suspension of activity |
| abrogate | to repeal; to set aside |
| abstruse | hard to understand or grasp |
| accolade | award or honor; high praise |
| accouterments | personal clothing, accessories, or equipment |
| adjure | to command or urge solemnly |
| adumbrate | to give a hint of things to come |
| aegis | protection; patronage |
| aggrieve | to distress; to mistreat |
| akimbo | slightly out of balance; having one's hands in a bent position on the hip |
| alacrity | chearful readiness or eagerness |
| castigate | to punish; to criticize severely |
| cavil | to raise trivial objectioins |
| chary | careful; cautious; wary |
| chicanery | deception or trickery |
| chimerical | wildly fanciful; absurd |
| circumlocution | wordy language; an indirect, roundabout expression |
| clout | influence |
| cogitate | to ponder over, to meditate |
| comport | to behave |
| compunction | remorse, feeling uneasy after having done something |
| concomitant | accompanying, attending, going along with |
| conflagration | a large, disastrous fire |
| contentious | argumentative |
| diurnal | occuring during the day, happens every day |
| doff | to take off (usually clothing) as a sign of greeting |
| doggerel | comic, sometimes crude, informal verse |
| dossier | a file of documents, letters, and records |
| dulcet | having a nice, agreeable, melodious sound |
| effete | exhausted, lost vitality |
| elan | vigor, distinctive style |
| encomium | eulogy or expression of high praise |
| endemic | native, belonging to a specific region |
| ennui | boredom, listlessness, lack of interest |
| flagellate | to whip, or to punish as if by whipping |
| foment | to stir up; to incite |
| fusillade | a rapid outburst, spray of gunfire |
| garrulous | talkative |
| gestalt | a structure, whose parts cannot stand alone |
| halitosis | bad breath |
| histrionic | overly dramatic, theatrical, deliberately affected |
| irascible | hot-tempered, cranky |
| itinerant | moving from place to place |
| leitmotif | a dominant or recurring theme |
| levee | an embankment designed to prevent a river from flooding |
| macerate | to soften by soaking, to cause to waste away |
| malapropism | the humorous misue of a word that sounds very much like the word intended |
| malfeasance | an illegal act especially by a public official |
| libation | a pouring of a liquid for a religious ceremony, a drink |
| lassitude | weariness, listlessness, a state of lethargy |
