Word of the Week #19

luminary \LOO-muh-ner-ee\, noun:
1. Any body that gives light, especially one of the heavenly bodies.
2. A person of eminence or brilliant achievement; as, Newton was a distinguished luminary.

. . . such jazz luminaries as Cab Calloway, Duke Ellington, Jimmie Lunceford, Louis Armstrong, and Earl Hines.
--Daniel Mark Epstein, Nat King Cole

Jefferson was deist, a luminary of the eighteenth-century Enlightenment who imagined God to be as reasonable and rational as the laws that govern the visible universe.
--Kenneth L. Woodward, The Book of Miracles

There's something comforting in those occasional lapses when a luminary lurches and trips over the humble stone his powerful torch somehow failed to reveal.
--Brad Leithauser, "You Haven't Heard the Last of This," New York Times, August 30, 1998

Luminary came to English by way of Middle French and Late Latin, and it traces back to the Latin word lumen, meaning "light". Other lumen descendants in English include "illuminate" (to light up), "luminous" (emitting light), and "phillumenist" (one who collects matchbooks or matchbox labels). "Luminary" has been shining its light in English since the 15th century.