Roentgenize, “to subject to the action of X-rays,” is named for Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen (1845–1923), who discovered X-rays in 1895. As we learned from the Word of the Day foehn, oe is an alternative way of representing ö in German when the umlaut (the horizontal pair of dots, also known as a dieresis) is not readily available. The same applies to German ä and ü, which may be written as ae and ue; compare the Word of the Day gemütlich. The surname Röntgen is, unfortunately for us language detectives, of uncertain origin. Roentgenize was first recorded in English in the late 1890s. EXAMPLE OF ROENTGENIZE USED IN A SENTENCE After Wilhelm Röngten roentgenized the hand of his wife, Anna, she examined her finger bones in the resulting image and chillingly remarked, “I have seen my death.”

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