13 August 2014

sessile

[ses-il, -ahyl]

adjective

1. Botany . attached by the base, or without any distinct projecting support, as a leaf issuing directly from the stem.
2. Zoology . permanently attached; not freely moving.

Origin:
1715–25; < Latin sessilis fit for sitting on, low enough to sit on, dwarfish (said of plants), equivalent to sess ( us ) (past participle of sedēre to sit1 ) + -ilis -ile

Related forms
ses·sil·i·ty [se-sil-i-tee] noun
pseu·do·ses·sile, adjective
sub·ses·sile, adjective

Today’s aphorism

In America they really do mythologise people when they die.

– Robin Williams

On this day

13 August 1784 – British Parliament enacts ‘Pitt’s India Act’, which brought the East India company under the control of the British government.

13 August 1899 – birth of Alfred Hitchcock, English movie director and producer.

13 August 1926 – birth of Fidel Castro, former Cuban President.

13 August 1946 – death of Herbert George ‘H.G.’ Wells, British science fiction writer, author of The War of the Worlds, Time Machine, Island of Dr Moreau, The War of the Worlds. Born 21 September 1866.

13 August 1961 – construction of the Berlin Wall commences.