perissological

English

Etymology

Compare French périssologique.

Adjective

perissological (comparative more perissological, superlative most perissological)

1. (rare) Redundant or excessive in words.
   • 1855 March, “A Trip to Lake Saltonstall”, in The Yale Literary Magazine, volume 20, page 180:

     We skated out tangents and cotangents of majestic circles, together with signs and wonders, versed, inversed, and reversed, which it would be perissological to enumerate.

   • 1886 February 27, W.L. Prosser, “Letter to the Editor”, in Secular Review: A Journal of Agnosticism, volume 18, page 142:

     I am reluctantly driven to thinking, however, that, as Mr. Schutze finds it as hard to believe these currently-accepted scientific explanations of phenomena as it is to believe in the Holy Trinity, his days of mental progress must have me to an end, in which case further discussion of these subjects would be but a perissological performance which would be better avoided.

   • 1908, Charles Francis Horne, The Technique of the Novel, page 126:

     There is no doubt that the ordinary reader would enjoy, and he certainly would profit much by, a revival of the classic work—if only he did not fall asleep over its magniloquent but perissological otiosity.

2. Serving to reinforce a message; having strong associations.
   • 2016, Pierre Lemonnier, Mundane Objects: Materiality and Non-verbal Communication, page 158:

     But these are changes that would modify neither the sets of values expressed in a perissological way nor the non-verbal communication that takes place around the artefact in question.

   • 2020, Niraj Kumar, George van Driem, Phunchok Stobdan, Himalayan Bridge, page 87:

     Perissological resonators can reveal relationships extant in various domains like kinship, exchange, death, marriage etc.

   • 2020, Bjørnar Olsen, Mats Burström, Caitlin DeSilvey, After Discourse: Things, Affects, Ethics:

     There was the links of those things, their perissological qualities (Lemonnier 2012), the world of artefacts, knowledge, symbols, rules, stories and emotions in which they were immersed.

Synonyms

• verbose
• wordy

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for “perissological”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.)

Related terms

• perissology