AskOxford: Word of the Day

Word of the Day from AskOxford: www.askoxford.com pica • noun Printing a unit of type size and line length equal to 12 points (about 16 inch or 4.2 mm). • [mass noun] a size of letter in typewriting, with 10 characters to the inch (about 3.9 to the centimetre). — origin late 16th cent.: from Anglo-Latin pica (literally ‘magpie’), commonly identified with a 15th-cent. book of rules about Church feasts, but no edition of such a pica printed in ‘pica’ type is known. Pronunciation available online: www.askoxford.com Source: Oxford Dictionary of English www.oup.com/uk/catalogue/?ci=9780198610571 Useful links from around OUP Do you have a question about the English that you would like answered by language expert Susie Dent in her new book? Send in your question by March 15th and some lucky contributors will see their question answered in print. Click here to submit your question Find out about OUP's Online Products: www.oup.com/online Sign up for Words of the Day in French, Spanish, German, Italian, Russian, or Chinese at www.oxfordlanguagedictionaries.com - now with audio! Special offer disgo and busbi USB keys - preloaded with a 30 day trial of the Concise Oxford English Dictionary: www.clever-stuff.ie We hope you have enjoyed your word of the day. However, if you wish to be removed from the mailing list please visit: www.askoxford.com/contactus/email Copyright © Oxford University Press 2008

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