Thursday word of the day : Sanguine

Paul Gauguin
Self-Portrait, 1889

sanguine \SANG-gwin\, adjective, noun;
Also used as a noun, red iron-oxide crayon used in making drawings:

1. cheerfully optimistic, hopeful, or confident
2. reddish; ruddy
3. (in old physiology) having blood as the predominating humor and consequently being ruddy-faced, cheerful, etc.
4. blood-red; red
5. Heraldry. a reddish-purple tincture.
6. a red iron-oxide crayon used in making drawings

by 1319, "type of red cloth," from Old French sanguin (feminine form, sanguine), from Latin sanguineus "of blood," also "bloody, bloodthirsty," from sanguis "blood." Meaning "blood-red" is recorded from 1382. Meaning "cheerful, hopeful, confident" first attested 1509, since these qualities were thought in medieval physiology to spring from an excess of blood as one of the four humors.

from dictionary.reference.com