This was one I took mental note of awhile ago. I don't recall the circumstances. I think I know what it means in a general sense--"a plethora of" means an abundance of, or more than enough of--something like that. But what does it mean more precisely or originally?
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You'll notice that no one ever exactly provides an answer to the question...
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A plethora is more an excess of or overabundance of than sheer abundance, though the sense of simple abundance is now also in the popular vernacular. That's why it was once used to describe a blood condition characterized by an excess of red blood corpuscles. Or earlier an excess of bodily fluids. It comes, through Latin, from the Greek plethore or "fullness". The sense of excess apparently comes later, at around 1700.
This is a perhaps rare case where a word has drifted eventually back to something more like its original sense.
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A plethora is really a surfeit, then. And that reminds me of how often one sees replete used as if the writer thought it meant complete.
ReplyDeleteGreat clip! The word 'plethora' always reminds me of this great opening:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACu2AR7fbCo
Peter, if I don't see replete in context, I always associate it to deplete.
ReplyDeletePlethora out of context sounds like a nice name for a galaxy.
Paul, oddly enough, I have never heard of Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill!, masterpiece of its type though I'm sure it is.
ReplyDeleteYes, I like to think that what this blog lacks in scholarship, expertise and editing, it makes up for with extremely random videoclips.
Plethora out of context sounds to me like a non-lethal, nearly obsolete disease, possibly tropical.
ReplyDeletePeter, judging by the pictures I elected not to show in favor of Three Amigos, you may just be right, baring the tropical aspects.
ReplyDeleteI experienced a plethora of giggles watching the clip.
ReplyDeleteHope they did you no harm, then, Kathleen!
ReplyDeleteYikes. I'm guessing you picked well when deciding what not to show.
ReplyDeleteIt isn't that terrible, but as they are showing pictures of poeple's faces, I don't think it's appropriate to use them as illustration in a not terribly serious blog.
ReplyDeleteI must have a lurid imagination, then.
ReplyDeleteOh, I'm sure there are some lurid pictures among the bunch.
ReplyDeleteI'm imagining pictures of tropical diseases, and trying not to.
ReplyDeleteI was just writing an email, and I wrote "plethora." After reading this post, I changed it to "overabundance," just so they were clear on my meaning!
ReplyDeleteCool and timely coincidence!
ReplyDelete