Sunday, December 29, 2013

Contronyms

I just stumbled upon this article on contronyms and found it fascinating! I'd never realized a word could be its own antonym before.

For example, 
Sanction (via French, from Latin sanctio(n-), from sancire ‘ratify,’) can mean ‘give official permission or approval for (an action)’ or conversely, ‘impose a penalty on.’

2 comments:

  1. What about cleave. Based on what the speaker told us at church, I think "cleave" might be a contender.

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