It's the Word of the Day podcast for April 9th.
Today's word is vouchsafe, spelled V-O-U-C-H-S-A-F-E.
Vouchsafe is a verb.
It's a formal and old-fashioned word,
meaning to give something to someone as a promise or a privilege.
Here's the word used in a sentence from The Daily Telegraph.
Arthur Conan Doyle wrote several horribly chilling tales of the supernatural,
although this might surprise readers who only know his Sherlock Holmes stories.
When there are eerie goings-on in the Holmes yarns,
a rational explanation is inevitably vouchsafe to Allah Scooby-Doo.
Shakespeare fans are well acquainted with the word vouchsafe,
which in its middle English form meant to grant consent ordain.
The word which was borrowed with its present meaning from Anglo-French in the 14th century pops up fairly frequently in the Bard's work 60 times to be exact.
Vouchsafe me yet your picture for my love beseeches Proteus of Sylvia in The Two Gentlemen of Verona.
Vouchsafe me Raymond bed and food King Lear begs his daughter Regan.
But you needn't turn to Shakespeare to find vouchsafe.
Today's writers still find it to be a perfectly useful word.
With your Word of the Day, I'm Peter Sokolowski.