Sloth

Goooooooooooood daaaaaaaaaaaaay to youuuuuuuuu, listeneeeeeeerrrrrr and thaaaaaank you for joining usssssssss today. You might think I’m speaking rather oddly, or even slowly today, dear listener, and you would be right, as I have been inspired by today’s word: sloth.

The ‘sloth’ is a type of mammal noted for their slow movement, who live in the tropical rainforests of Central and South America. They spend most of their lives hanging upside down in trees, and are closely related to anteaters. With a low metabolism, sloths have a low-energy diet of leaves, and though they are terrible on the ground, can hang from trees easily and even swim. They have a shaggy coat with grooved hair, and host green algae which helps them to camouflage, hiding from predatory hawks and cats. 

The word ‘sloth’ comes from  the Middle English ‘slouthe’ or ‘slewthe’ meaning ‘laziness’, from the Old English ‘slǣwþ’, also meaning ‘laziness’ or ‘indolence’, which in turn is from the Proto-Germanic ‘*slaiwiþō’ meaning ‘slowness’ or ‘lateness’. As well as being the word for the aforementioned mammal, ‘sloth’ can also mean ‘laziness; slowness in the mindset; disinclination to action or labour’, or more rarely, is used for the collective noun for bears, as in ‘a sloth of bears came by and attacked the camping ground.’ No official collective noun for a group of sloths is recorded, although some that are used include a ‘slumber’ of sloths, a ‘snuggle’ of sloths, or my personal favourite, a ‘bed’ of sloths. 

Sloth is also one of the seven deadly sins - a Catholic list of cardinal sins from the 13th century. It is described as the ‘sin of omitting responsibility’ in contrast to the other sins, which are generally speaking immoral in nature. 

Isn’t language wonderful?

Written by Taylor Davidson, Read by Zane C Weber

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