emollient

<font size="-1" face="arial, helvetica"> <p> <strong> <font color="#000066">Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for September 26, 2020 is:</font> </strong> </p> <p> <strong>emollient</strong> &#149; \ih-MAHL-yunt\&nbsp; &#149; <em>noun</em><br /> <p><strong>:</strong> something that softens or soothes</p> </p> <p> <strong>Examples:</strong><br /> <p>"It was a nasal <em>emollient</em> called Ponaris. It was once, the packaging advertised, a NASA staple—included in the agency's medical space kit on every Apollo mission.… The package promised that it would help <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/rose%20fever">rose fever</a>, which I'd become convinced I had gotten from all that potpourri, so I bought it." — <a href="https://nymag.com/strategist/article/ponaris-nasal-emollient-review.html">Chantel Tattoli, <em>The Strategist</em>, 18 May 2020</a></p> <p>"The good news is it's not impossible or even terribly hard to mix up some of your own hand sanitizer. Commercial variants are little more than a whole lot of ordinary alcohol and a generous dollop of some kind of <em>emollient</em> to keep the skin from drying out." — <a href="https://time.com/5812986/diy-coronavirus-products/">Jeffrey Kluger, <em>Time</em>, 1 Apr. 2020</a></p> </p> <p> <strong>Did you know?</strong><br /> <p><em>Emollient</em> derives from the present participle of the Latin verb <em>emollire</em>, which, unsurprisingly, means "to soften or soothe." <em>Emollire</em>, in turn, derives ultimately from <em>mollis</em>, meaning "soft." Another descendant of <em>mollis</em> is <em><a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/mollify">mollify</a></em> (essentially meaning "to make softer in temper or disposition"). A more distant relative is <em><a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/mild">mild</a></em>, which can be traced back to the same ancient source as <em>mollis</em>. The adjective <em>emollient</em> first appeared in print in English in the early 1600