Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for March 14, 2026 is:





rash • \RASH\ • adjective

Rash describes something done or made quickly and without thought about what will happen as a result. It can also describe someone who is doing something rash.

// I later regretted having made such a rash promise in a moment of chaos.

// Don't be rash about this decision. Take your time.

See the entry >





Examples:

“The climactic scenes toy with the blurred lines between hallucination and reality, but the logic falls apart; threads like Hana’s rash decision to undertake a dangerous surgical fix virtually evaporate without much payoff.” — David Rooney, The Hollywood Reporter, 3 Feb. 2026





Did you know?

Is it possible that the origins of the noun rash (referring to a group of red spots on the skin that is caused by an illness or a reaction to something) and the adjective rash (meaning “overly hasty”) are the same? Not so fast! Like many homonyms—“two or more words spelled and pronounced alike but different in meaning”—the two rashes have distinct sources. The noun rash, which first appeared in English in the late 17th century, probably comes ultimately from the Latin verb rādere, meaning “to scrape, scratch, shave.” The adjective rash appears to be about two centuries older, and comes from a Middle English word rasch meaning “active, quick, eager.”

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for March 13, 2026 is:





immure • \ih-MYOOR\ • verb

To immure something is to enclose it within or as if within walls. Immure is also sometimes used synonymously with imprison.

// Scientists at the research station in Antarctica are immured by the frozen wild that surrounds them.

See the entry >





Examples:

"The Torlonia collection, which Alessandro Torlonia moved into a private museum in Rome in 1875, went into hiding in the early 1940s. ... Disputes among family members and with the government left the marbles hidden away, gathering dust and grime. For all those years scholars had to beg and bribe to get in. One government official, desperate to see what gems the Torlonia prince had immured, resorted to dressing up as a cleaner." — Jason Farago, The New York Times, 16 Apr. 2025





Did you know?

Like mural, immure comes from murus, a Latin noun meaning "wall." Immure came to English by way of the Medieval Latin verb immurare, formed from murus and the prefix in- (meaning "in" or "within"). Immure, which first appeared in English in the late 16th century, literally means "to wall in" or "to enclose with a wall," but it has extended meanings as well. In addition to senses meaning "to imprison" and "to entomb," the word sometimes has broader applications, essentially meaning "to shut in" or "to confine." One might remark, for example, that a very studious acquaintance spends most of her time "immured in the library."

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for March 12, 2026 is:





gambit • \GAM-bit\ • noun

A gambit is something done or said in order to gain an advantage or to produce a desired effect.

// The workers’ opening gambit in the negotiations was to demand a wage hike.

See the entry >





Examples:

“Now the book publishing industry has sent a message to all A.I. companies: Our intellectual property isn’t yours for the taking, and you cannot act with impunity. This settlement is an opening gambit in a critical battle that will be waged for years to come.” — Andrea Bartz, The New York Times, 1 Oct. 2025





Did you know?

Don’t let the similarities of sound and general flavor between gambit and gamble trip you up; the two words are unrelated. Gambit first appeared in English in a 1656 chess handbook that was said to feature almost a hundred illustrated gambetts. Gambett traces back first to the Spanish word gambito, and before that to the Italian gambetto, from gamba meaning “leg.” Gambetto referred to the act of tripping someone, as in wrestling, in order to gain an advantage. In chess, gambit (or gambett, as it was once spelled) originally referred to a chess opening whereby the bishop’s pawn is intentionally sacrificed—or tripped—to gain an advantage in position. Gambit is now applied to many other chess openings, but after being pinned down for years, it also finally broke free of chess’s hold and is used generally to refer to any “move,” whether literal or rhetorical, done to get a leg up, so to speak. While such moves can be risky, gambit is not synonymous with gamble, which likely comes from Old English gamen, meaning “amusement, jest, pastime”—source too of game.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for March 11, 2026 is:





besotted • \bih-SAH-tud\ • adjective

Someone described as besotted is so in love that they are unable to think clearly; they are utterly infatuated. Besotted can also be used as a synonym of drunk.

// The opening scene of the movie follows a besotted couple at a party, the camera’s focus emphasizing their ignorance of all that’s around them.

See the entry >





Examples:

“Kathrin [tour guide] is endearingly besotted with her adopted country and spoke about it with the reverence of a convert. Some more things I heard from her that contribute to people in Finland being happy included: sauna culture discouraging fatphobia; emphasis on design—that means even very basic, cheap things are beautiful and robust; and, of course, nature.” — Imogen West-Knights, Slate, 27 Aug. 2025





Did you know?

Stumble on the word sot and you will likely find it attached to a person who tends to over-imbibe. The word has referred to a habitual drunkard since the late 16th century, and before that—from the days of Old English—it referred to a fool generally. The now-archaic verb sot followed a similar trajectory, its original meaning of “to cause to appear foolish” being joined later by its “to drink alcohol excessively” meaning. The earliest known recorded use of the related adjective besotted (in the late 16th century, from the the verb besot), however, described a state of figurative intoxication: one besotted was stupefied by love rather than liquor. The still-current sense of besotted meaning “drunk” didn’t show up until the early 19th century. In fact, evidence of the “infatuated” sense of besotted also predates the tipple-related senses of the noun sot, verb sot, and verb besot, suggesting perhaps that love may be the strongest intoxicant of all.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for March 10, 2026 is:





mea culpa • \may-uh-KOOL-puh\ • noun

The noun mea culpa is used for a formal acknowledgment of personal fault or error.

// The podcast host's mea culpa did little to satisfy those who found the episode deeply offensive.

See the entry >





Examples:

"... his apology was the best public mea culpa of this century. ... It was delivered without hesitation, qualification or blame shifting." — John Mosig, The Age (Melbourne, Australia), 24 Oct. 2025





Did you know?

Mea culpa means "through my fault" in Latin. Said by itself, it's an exclamation of apology or remorse that is used to mean "It was my fault" or "I apologize." Mea culpa is also a noun, however. A newspaper might issue a mea culpa for printing inaccurate information, or a politician might give a speech making mea culpas for past wrongdoings. Mea culpa is one of many English terms that come from the Latin culpa, meaning "guilt." Some other examples are culpable ("meriting condemnation or blame especially as wrong or harmful"), culprit ("one guilty of a crime or a fault"), and exculpate ("to clear from alleged fault or guilt").