lapsus oculi
/ˌlæpsəs ˈɑkjəˌlaɪ/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 1.19 in modern English
15
Scrabble Score
11
Letters
4
Syllables
8
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
An error that results from looking in the wrong place, especially one that occurs while copying or translating a body of text.
Formal
Example Sentences
- "Oh, a mere lapsus oculi. The Doctor's optics were not quite so sound, as he imagined."
- "[T]he name Tetragonopterus was due to a lapsus oculi of [Georges] Cuvier and never appeared in that form till 1815; […]"
- "Well, if what he runs into is the comely member, all may turn out for the best, as more than one romance has burgeoned in a Cottage Hospital. If, on the other hand, it is the local reservoir or a passing pantechnicon, he will probably regret his lapsus oculi (I think)."
- "It has been carelessly copied and contains many lapsus oculi: frequently a single word has been omitted, obviously through inattention; occasionally a line or two of the archetype has been skipped, so that completely separate sentences have been fused together; sometimes simple mis-readings occur."
- "The straightforward and economical explanation of this mistake is a lapsus oculi on the part of the mason triggered by the structural similarity in his draft of the local freak beta and the mu which immediately followed it."
- "Was it a simple lapsus oculi on the part of the translator, a kind of scribal error that led to an involuntary deletion?"
Etymology
Word Breakdown
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˌlæpsəs ˈɑkjəˌlaɪ/
- British English: /ˌlæpsəs ˈɒkjʊlaɪ/