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I'm looking for an arcane or obscure word to describe a person's daily record.

Words like:

account, agenda, appointment book, chronicle, diary, daily record, daybook, engagement book, journal, log, minutes, notebook, record

work, but are common. Do you have something more obscure?

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Arcane and obscure seem subjective criteria, to me. – kiamlaluno Mar 12 '11 at 0:49
4  
If you don't know the meaning of a posted answer, upvote it. The most arcane word will float to the top, and you'll have objective proof of it. ;) – ash Mar 12 '11 at 0:52
I will wait somebody writes an Old English word, then. – kiamlaluno Mar 12 '11 at 1:09

5 Answers

up vote 10 down vote accepted

Ephemeris has an obsolete meaning synonymous with this, and it certainly has a solid arcane flavor to it. Also rather lovely is noctuary, which is the opposite of "diary", logging what happens during the night rather than the day.

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up vote 5 down vote

How about the Latin libellus.

It is used for any "little book", but specifically journals, diaries, logbooks, notebooks.

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up vote 3 down vote

It's not a very good fit in meaning, but vade mecum springs to mind - literally, it's Latin for "go with me", and it means a little book with useful information that you carry around with you. It can contain a section for daily notes and such, although that is not its primary purpose.

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up vote 2 down vote

Any of those would be rendered more recondite were you to add the adjective quotidian to them.

quotidian of or occurring every day; daily : the car sped noisily off through the quotidian traffic. • ordinary or everyday, esp. when mundane : his story is an achingly human one, mired in quotidian details.

So you might refer to someone's "quotidian chronicle" if you wanted to be all, like, abstruse & stuff.

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I could always add modifiers, but I'm looking for a word that has fallen out of favor. – ash Mar 12 '11 at 0:44
up vote 2 down vote

'Grimoire' is more specifically an instruction book, particularly dark, used by alchemists or sorcerers, but could describe a diary or journal of a similarly dark person.

Similarly arcane is 'Book of Shadows', as popularized by Gerald Gardner.

There is also 'apocryphon', which means secret writing. It has a strong tie to the early Christian movement, especially gnosticism.

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