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Word of the DayTuesday, August 08, 2006

ascribe

\uh-SKRYB\ , transitive verb:

To attribute, as to a source or cause; as, "they ascribed the poor harvest to drought."

To attribute, as a quality; to consider or allege to belong; as, "ascribed jealousy to the critics."

Quotes:

Scholars conventionally ascribe Hemingway's creative dissolution to drinking and depression, but to me that has always seemed too simple.

-- D. T. Max, "Ernest Hemingway's War Wounds", New York Times Magazine, July 18, 1999

Plainness won't do for today's cookbook writers; when they're not emoting over mere food, they ascribe all sorts of fanciful powers to it.

-- "Shut Up and Eat!", New York Times, November 24, 1996

Origin:

Ascribe is from Latin ascribere, "to write in, to add in writing, hence to attribute," from ad- + scribere, "to write."