Taut, Taught, Taunt

He had the high cheekbones of the Indian race in his blood, the skin taut and faintly redolent of vermilion as if he bore the faint traces of war paint. His black eyes twinkled like sun-shot agates whenever he turned his head to catch the radiant streaks of the afternoon light.” –Snake Eyes by Joy Sherman

Taut is an adjective. Taut refers to ropes, cables, muscles that are tight, firm; not slack. Referring to nerves, taught means tense (taut nerves!).

Something that is drawn or pulled tight such as taut sails, taut clothesline, taut wire.

Taut refers to something that is subjected to tension, stretched out; and referring to the skin of a person it means the skin is not slack but firm based on their race and other factors.

The opposite of taut is lax, relaxed.

Tauten is a verb meaning something that is taut or tauter.

Clotheslines are tautened to stay still, and unaffected to the wind.

The grammatical variants of taut are tauts, tauting, tauted and the superlative forms: tauter and tautest; tautly (adverb), and tautness (noun).

People will not take it pleasantly if you speak tautly.

Referring to nautical context, taughten also means to tighten, to increase in intensity, Taught is the past tense and past participle of teach: Teach–Taught–Taught.

Taught is the past tense of ‘to teach’.

Teaching is imparting skills, informing the knowledge seekers, enriching the knowledge of students.

Teach / taught also means getting accustomed gradually to something either pleasant or unpleasant: Citizens are taught to obey the rules and laws of the land, if not, they will be penalized or punished.

Taunt means to jeer, insult Taunt as a noun refers to is an insult, a provocation.

Taunt as verb means assail with taunts, reproach a person contemptuously (it comes from the French word ‘tant pour tant’ – tit for tat.

The variants of taunt are taunts, taunted, taunting, taunter (noun) and tauntingly (adverb).

Taut- is the alternative form of tauto-: tauto functions as the prefix in the formation of words like tautology, tautegorial, tautogram (text in which all the words start with the same letter but not the same sound).

Tautology (tautos means same, logos means explanation) means useless repetition (he has adequate enough money); and in the study of logic, tautology means a statement that is necessarily true.

Tautologies are: null and void, moments in time, past history, deliberately targeted…

Tautonym is binomial name having the same name twice: Bison bison, AsadAsad, Vulpesvulpes (genus and species name of red fox).

By: Kovuuri G Reddy