Word of the Day for Monday April 4, 2005 amanuensis \un-man-yoo-EN-sis\, noun; plural amanuenses, \-seez\: A person employed to take dictation or to copy manuscripts. The chore of actually writing the words in the end fell to a hand-picked amanuensis. --Austin Baer, "River of Desire," [1]Atlantic, October 1996 On this blue day, I want to be nothing more than an amanuensis to the birds, transcribing all the bits and snatches of song riding in on the wind. --Barbara Crooker, "Transcription (Poem)," [2]Midwest Quarterly, March 22, 2003 When it comes to literature, the French count the largest number of Nobel Prizes; their authors include one who wrote a whole book without using the letter `e' and another who, suffering from `locked-in syndrome' after a severe stroke, dictated a memoir by blinking his eye as an amanuensis read through the alphabet. --Jonathan Fenby, [3]France on the Brink _________________________________________________________ Amanuensis comes from Latin, from the phrase (servus) a manu, "slave with handwriting duties," from a, ab, "by" + manu, from manus, "hand." References 1. http://www.theatlantic.com/ 2. http://www.pittstate.edu/engl/mwq/MQindex.html 3. http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1559705248/ref=nosim/lexico Dictionary.com Entry and Pronunciation http://dictionary.reference.com/search?r=9&q=amanuensis