Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for February 17, 2023 is: anachronism \uh-NAK-ruh-niz-um\ noun

An anachronism is an error in which something in a movie, story, etc., is placed in a time where it does not belong. Anachronism can also refer to a person or a thing that seems to belong to the past and to not fit in the present.

// A number of the film's critics complained about the multiple anachronisms in the historical drama.

// He's an old-fashioned politician who is seen by many of his colleagues as an anachronism.

[See the entry >](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/anachronism)

Examples:

“[The video game] Pentiment follows Andreas Maler, an artist who arrives at a small Bavarian town to assist a monastery in producing its illuminated manuscripts. The monastery’s [scriptorium](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/scriptorium) is already an anachronism, because the recent invention of the printing press has started to allow almost anyone to mass-disseminate information, loosening the church’s grip on the written word and reducing the demand for meticulously hand-drawn manuscripts.” — Matt James, The Ringer, 16 Dec. 2022

Did you know?

An anachronism is an error of [chronology](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/chronology) in which something, such as an object or event, is placed in the wrong time. Shakespeare’s play [Julius Caesar](https://www.britannica.com/topic/Julius-Caesar-by-Shakespeare) includes a famous anachronism, with Cassius alluding to a mechanical clock (“The clock hath stricken three”) in a play whose events take place more than a thousand years before mechanical clocks were invented. Anachronism has its roots in Greek chronos, “time,” and ana-, a Greek prefix meaning “up,” “back,” or “again.” Anachronisms historically were sometimes distinguished from [parachronisms](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/parachronism), chronology errors in which an event is placed later than it occurred. Both anachronism and parachronism (and also the latter’s now-obsolete synonym [metachronism](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/metachronism)) date to the 17th century, but only anachronism has stood the test of time.