pellucid
adjective

- very clear in meaning and easy to understand

- admitting maximum passage of light without diffusion or distortion

Cambridge Dictionary / Merriam-Webster

—
WORD ORIGIN

From Latin pellucidus, from perlucere “to shine through”, from per- “through” + lucere “to shine”. Ultimately from the Indo-European root leuk- “light” — that is also the source of other words such as lunar, lunatic, light, lightning, lucid, illuminate, illustrate, translucent, and lux.

—
PELLUCID v. NON-PELLUCID PROSE

This sentence shines. It’s concise. It’s powerful. It knows what it wants to say, and it says it in clear, bold terms.

But upon quickly or slowly reading a sentence such as this, in which the writer clearly feels an obligation to make a point regarding various issues pertaining to general written communication, it suddenly becomes more than clear that this is a sentence whose aspirations of shining have been eclipsed by the showcasing of linguistic grandiloquence.

—
THE FABULOUS LAND OF PELLUCIDAR

Pellucidar is a fictional Hollow Earth invented by American writer Edgar Rice Burroughs for a series of action adventure stories.

The stories initially involve the adventures of mining heir David Innes and his inventor friend Abner Perry after they use an "iron mole" to burrow 500 miles into the Earth's crust. Later protagonists include indigenous caveman Tanar and additional visitors from the surface world, notably Tarzan, Jason Gridley, and Frederich Wilhelm Eric von Mendeldorf und von Horst.

In Burroughs' concept, the Earth is a hollow shell with Pellucidar as the internal surface of its shell. Pellucidar is accessible to the surface world via a polar tunnel, allowing passage between both the inner and outer worlds. Although the inner surface of the Earth has a smaller total area than the outer, Pellucidar actually has a greater land area, as its continents mirror the surface world's oceans and its oceans mirror the surface world's continents.

The peculiarities of Pellucidar's geography are caused by the concave curvature of its surface. There is no horizon; the further distant an object is, the higher it appears to be, until it is finally lost in a void of atmospheric haze.

Pellucidar is lit by a miniature sun suspended at the center of the hollow sphere, so it is perpetually overhead and gives a sensation of eternal noon wherever one is in Pellucidar. The sole exception is a region directly under a tiny geostationary moon of the internal sun. As a result, this region is under a perpetual eclipse and is known as the "Land of Awful Shadow". The miniature sun does not change in brightness and never sets. As a result, with no night or seasonal progression, the natives have little concept of time.

The events of the series suggest that time is elastic, passing at different rates in different areas of Pellucidar and varying even in single locations. Also, several characters living in Pellucidar who are originally from the outer world appear to age slowly and exhibit considerable longevity. This is known through their interactions with visitors from the outer world, where time passes at a fixed rate.

Adapted from Wikipedia

—
SYNONYMS

absolutely clear, as clear as a bell (as crystal, as day), as plain as day (as plain as the nose on your face), as simple as ABC, black and white, clear (-cut), comprehensible, cut and dried, easy to grasp (to see), explicit, graspable, intelligible, PELLUCID, readily understood, self-explanatory, simple, straightforward, uncomplicated, understandable, unequivocal
—
as clear as crystal, as transparent as glass, crystalline, cloudless, crystal clear, diamond-like, diaphanous, entirely clear, flawless, glass-like, glassy, gossamer, ice-clear, limpid, like crystal, like glass, lucent, lucid, mirror-like, PELLUCID, perfectly clear, see-through, sheer, translucent, transparent, vitreous, water-clear, water-like

—
SMUGGLE OWAD into a conversation, say something like:

“When lost in a sea of jargon, a PELLUCID explanation is like suddenly finding dry land!”

—
HERZLICHEN DANK to all readers helping me keep OWAD alive with single or monthly donations.

Every month, I spend evening and weekend hours with my family researching and writing your daily OWAD. It remains FREE, AD-free, and ALIVE thanks to voluntary donations from appreciative readers.

If you aren’t already, please also consider supporting us - even the equivalent of a single cup of coffee a month will help us cover mailing, site hosting, and maintenance costs. Just head over to DonorBox:

https://donorbox.org/please-become-a-friend-of-owad-5-3

or bank transfer to Paul Smith
IBAN: DE75 7316 0000 0002 5477 40
Please use your email-address as ‘Verwendungszweck’

Thank you,
Paul