Undulate - plus, How Do You Pronounce 'Groceries'?

[Merriam-Webster]( WORD OF THE DAY October 28, 2019 undulate [Audio pronunciation]( verb | UN-juh-layt Definition 1 : to form or move in waves : [fluctuate]( 2 : to rise and fall in volume, pitch, or cadence 3 : to present a wavy appearance Scroll down for more about undulate TRENDING NOW: [lynch]( [egregious]( [emolument]( [kangaroo court]( [SEE ALL [>]]( PEOPLE ARE READING [How Do You Pronounce 'Groceries'?]( [The Good, The Bad, & The Semantically Imprecise - 10/25/19]( [What It Means to ‘Touch Base’]( [Giving Meaning to the Latin (and French) in 'The Exorcist']( WORD GAMES AND QUIZZES: WEEKLY CHALLENGE [Word Puzzles]( Challenge yourself with these word puzzles. Can you solve them all? [PLAY NOW]( Nailed this quiz? We have plenty more to try! [TAKE ME THERE [>]]( Did You Know? Undulate and [inundate]( are word cousins that branch from unda, the Latin word for "wave." No surprise there. But would you have guessed that [abound]( [surround]( and [redound]( are also unda offspring? The connection between unda and these words is easier to see when you learn that at some point in their early histories each of them essentially had the meaning of "to overflow"—a meaning that inundate still carries, along with its "overwhelm" sense. Examples of UNDULATE "He could hear the muffled fart of a tuba from the German [oompah]( band warming up in Feltman's beer garden. Beyond the garden was the Ziz coaster, hissing and undulating through the trees with the peculiar sound that gave it its name." — Kevin Baker, Dreamland, 1999 "Mats of bright green [duckweed]( undulated in the slow current of the La Crosse River, reminding an observer of the shape shifting in a lava lamp." — [Dave Skoloda, The La Crosse (Wisconsin) Tribune, 4 Sept. 2019]( Word Family Quiz Fill in the blanks to complete a word derived from Latin unda that refers to a "water nymph": und _ _ _. [VIEW THE ANSWER [>]]( MORE WORD FUN: [WORD GAMES [>]]( [TRENDING NOW [>]]( [WORDS AT PLAY [>]]( FOLLOW US: [Facebook]( [Twitter]( [YouTube]( [Instagram]( SHARE: [Facebook]( [Twitter]( [View this email in a web browser]( You are receiving this email because you opted in to receive Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day. [Unsubscribe from Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day]( [Manage your subscription settings]( Merriam-Webster, Inc. 47 Federal Street, P.O. Box 281 Springfield, MA, 01102, USA [www.merriam-webster.com]( | [Privacy Policy]( © 2019 by Merriam-Webster, Inc.