A Jumble of J and K Words Trivia Quiz

Answer: jardiniere

If you know a little French you might recognize that 'jardiniere' comes from the word 'jardin', meaning garden, and in fact it means "gardener". It usually refers to works of pottery, earthenware, or metal that function as planters, cachepots, or other containers for flowers or plants. The word is typically limited to the sort used for interior decoration, but there are some decorators who include outdoor pots and plant stands as well. A cachepot is a tabletop vessel for plants with holes cut in the bottom (requiring a sauce to put underneath).

Interestingly, it has also come to mean a garnish of diced and cooked (usually boiled) fresh vegetables served around a dish of meat.

Answer: jejune

The word comes from the Latin 'ieiunus', which means "empty, barren", or literally "fasting, hungry". It has the same origin as the Greek word 'agios' meaning "holy", and it refers to the Roman custom of making the first sacrifice of the day before breakfast, on an empty stomach.

The second division of the small intestine is the 'jejunum', called so because during dissections in the late Middle Ages it was typically found empty. (This is probably because it tends to drain out whenever a cadaver is placed on its back).

Answer: japan (not the country)

A japan provides a durable glossy finish, and decorating and object with such a coating is called "japanning". It is named for the Japanese lacquer-work that Westerners encountered in the 17th century.

Since japanned items are customarily black, "japanned" for a while was slang for "ordained as a priest", as the everyday wear for Catholic and Orthodox priests and other clergy is typically black. This sense appears to have become obsolete.

Answer: kolinsky

The word "kolinsky" derives from the Russian 'kolinskii', which refers to the Kola Peninsula, situated in northwestern Russia between the Barents and White seas.

Kolinsky can specifically refer to the fur of a species of northern Eurasian mink (Mustela sibrica), which sports a rich, dark brown coat with tawny streaks. A medium-sized creature commonly called the Siberian weasel or the kolonok, it ranges from Himalayas to China, North Korea, and Taiwan, as well as from the Urals through Siberia to the Russian Far East.

There is a particularly expensive artists' paintbrush called the kolinsky sable-hair brush (though the kolonok is a weasel, not a sable), and kolinsky brushes are also used for painting dental porcelain. Because the kolonok is named in the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) of Wild Fauna and Flora, such brushes became illegal to ship into the USA in 2013.

Answer: kip

Kip is a portmanteau of "kilo" (1000) and "pound" (because it is literally 1000 pounds). There are 2000 pounds in a U.S. ton (also called a short ton), so a kip is half a ton. Kip also refers to the undressed hide of an animal, especially a small or young one, such as a calf or a lamb, (though the origin of this sense is uncertain).

In Laos, the basic unit of currency is also called the kip, and in 2022 there were about 11,000 to the U.S. dollar. In British slang, a kip is also place to sleep, and as a verb it means to sleep or take a nap.

But have a care, in Ireland it means a brothel!

Answer: kobold

The German word 'kobold' for these household goblins is also what the silver miners of the low-rising Harz Mountains in central Germany called the rock laced with arsenic and sulfur, for it made them extremely sick. The metallic element cobalt, named in 1733 by George Brandt of Sweden from 'kobold', was extracted from this poisonous rock. A mineral comprised of this element had been used to color glass blue since the 16th century.

In chapter 13 of his novel 'Kim', Rudyard Kipling used the word to describe some people he met in the Spiti Valley in the modern Indian state of Himachal Pradesh. ('Spiti' literally means "the middle land" between India and Tibet). He wrote, "They looked like kobolds from some magic mine -- gnomes of the hills in conclave".

Answer: joss

From the figure of deity it came to signify luck as well. A thin stick of perfumed paste burned as incense before a Chinese shrine or joss may be referred to as a 'joss-stick'. Josses are often used for divination in both China and Taiwan, and they are often decorated with gold plaques.

The etymology is interesting. While 'joss' comes from Chinese Pidgin English in the 18th century, it originated from the Javanese word 'dejos', which the Javans got from the Portuguese 'deus', meaning "god".

Answer: kedge

To warp a vessel in general is to move a vessel by hauling on a line fastened onto or around something. Specifically to kedge a vessel, then, is to draw it along by hauling in the cable of a light anchor that has been dropped at some distance from it.

This light anchor is called a kedge-anchor or simply a kedge (and the towline is called a warp). It's a word of Scandinavian origin that entered the English lexicon in the 17th century.

Answer: jehu

This sense of "jehu" as a driver or a coachman comes from the phrase "to drive like Jehu", who was a king of Israel noted for swift and savage attacks by chariot, "for he driveth furiously" (II Kings 9:20 AV). Jehu is also known for slaying the wicked queen Jezebel, along with the sons of the evil king Ahab and the prophets of Ba'al (II Kings 9:11-30). His dates of birth and death are believed by some scholars to be 842 and 815 B.C. (or thereabouts).

Nathaniel Hawthorn used the phrase in his short story "Mrs. Bullfrog", in the collection 'Mosses from an Old Manse' (846). He wrote, "Our Jehu [sic] had carelessly driven over a heap of gravel and fairly capsized the coach, with the wheels in the air and our heels where our heads should have been."

Answer: kwashiorkor

Symptoms of kwashiorkor include lethargy, slowed growth, anemia, swelling, skin lightening, hair loss or change in hair color. and perhaps most notably a peculiar potbelly. The name of the disease, most often seen in Third-World countries, comes from a Niger-Congo language spoken in Ghana, called Ga. It literally means the sickness of a weanling who has been displaced by a new sibling (for mother's milk has enough protein to forestall the disease, so the newly weaned begin to suffer when they no longer have access to this source of nutrition).

Besides Africa, kwashiorkor has been observed in Central America, Jamaica, and even the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico. Jamaican pediatrician Cicely Williams, who was the first to distinguish the kwashiorkor from other diseases of malnutrition, used the Ga name in published medical research in the 1930s. Williams also condemned the European colonial powers for promoting formula in lieu of mother's milk, which caused rates of the disease to spike in Africa. She called it "the most criminal form of sedition, and that those deaths should be regarded as murder".