Sometimes you run across a word that’s so obscure, obsolete, or forgotten that it doesn’t even appear in the best dictionaries. Adoxography is one example; it’s pretty difficult to find a definition, and you have to go back to the early 20th century to find any examples of it.
Nevertheless, “adoxography” — the method of teaching (which is what it is), not the word — has been around for centuries. It’s a way of teaching rhetoric in which the student composes a speech in support of something that’s usually considered undesirable. The lesson might be “give me 1000 words on why stupidity is good”. There was a book published in 1593 explaining the approach, and (here’s a surprise) the preface explains that it’s of particular use for lawyers. “Adoxography” the word first appeared in 1903 as “adoxographical.” Speaking of obscurity, it appeared in the American Journal of Philology. “Adoxography” itself was used in 1909 in The Conflict of Religions in the Early Roman Empire, a book by Terrot Glover. I haven’t noticed it on any historical bestseller lists, but I could have missed it.
There was a review in a publication from Trinity College in Melbourne that took note of “adoxography.” Dr. Alex Leeper suggested that it was an “ungainly word” that “will not, it is to be hoped, take root in the language.” It would appear his wish was almost completely granted. It’s possible that if he could review the current state of “adoxography,” Dr. Leeper would be seized by victorious cachinnatory glee, much as described by Edward Bulwer-Lytton in his 1842 novel Paul Clifford:
“If Paul’s comrade laughed at first, he now laughed ten times more merrily than ever. He threw his full length of limb upon a neighbouring sofa, and literally rolled with cachinnatory convulsions; nor did his risible emotions subside until the entrance of the hung-beef restored him to recollection.”
“Cachinnatory” comes from the Latin word “cachinnare”, and means laughing too loudly — particularly in the case when it makes everyone nearby uncomfortable. Lytton, by the way, was pretty much the J.K.Rowling of his day (his day being the mid-1800s); he made a large fortune from his bestselling novels. He also coined the phrase “the pen is mightier than the sword”, and is best known these days for the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, which you can win by coming up with the worst possible opening line for a novel. But it’s a high bar; the contest was inspired by that same novel, “Paul Clifford.” It begins:
“It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents—except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along the housetops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness.”
Perhaps Lytton’s early education featured too much (or too little) adoxography.
