Wondrous Words Wednesdays

Wondrous Words Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Kathy aka Bermuda Onion where we share new (to us) words that we’ve encountered in our reading. Feel free to join in the fun.

I recently finished reading a compilation of Poe stories and while there were certainly many wondrous words in his writing, I was intrigued by moiety:

From The Pit and The Pendulum:

Scarcely had I dropped my head back into its original position, when there flashed upon my mind what I cannot better describe than as the deformed half of that idea of deliverance to whick I have been previously alluded, and of which a moiety only floated indeterminately through my brain when I raised food to my burning lips.

Here's the definition from Merriam Webster:

Moi-e-ty
noun \ˈmȯi-ə-tē\

plural moi·e·ties
1 a : one of two equal parts : half b : one of two approximately equal parts

2: one of the portions into which something is divided : component, part moiety>

3: one of two basic complementary tribal subdivisions