vatic

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for March 20, 2009 is: vatic • \VAT-ik\ • adjective : prophetic, oracular Examples: The vatic voice of these poems, untempered by humor or irony, sounds more pretentious than profound. Did you know? Some people say only thin lines separate poetry, prophecy, and madness. We don't know if that's generally true, but it is in the case of "vatic." The adjective derives directly from the Latin word "vates," meaning "seer" or "prophet." But that Latin root is in turn distantly related to an Old English word for "poetry," an Old High German word for "madness," and an Old Irish word for "seer" or "poet." See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.