The Word of the Day podcast for September 11th.
Today's word is patina, spelled P-A-T-I-N-A.
Patina is a noun.
A patina is a usually green film that forms on copper
and bronze that is exposed to moist air for an extended time.
The word patina can also refer to a shiny or dark surface
that over time forms naturally on something such as wood or leather or to a literal or figurative thin layer.
Here's the word used in a sentence from the LA Times.
Family, friends, and neighbors filled the frames with dancing and dominoes, their apartments painted in shades of mint,
butter yellow, and pink, flecked with a patina cultivated by humidity and time.
When Italians applied the word patina to the green film that forms on the surface of copper,
they were drawing from Latin.
In which patina means a shallow dish.
Presumably the Italian meaning developed from the observation of such film forming on copper dishes.
By the mid-18th century, English speakers were also calling the green film patina.
And by the 20th century, they'd expanded the word's application to surface appearances of things
that have grown more beautiful with age or use.
Think of an old wooden desk or tarnished silver goblet.
Use of the word to refer to thin layers, both literal and figurative,
as in a patina of grime or a patina of respectability, followed soon after.