Addendum for Ass Scholars

Jesse (who, despite his faithful reading, narrowly missed inclusion in the 2004 Reader All-Star Team because he never posts comments) alerted me to the existence of two words meaning "having a comely behind" other than "bootylicious." The words are "callipygian" and "callipygous." My dictionary counts them as the same word, and defines them as "having beautiful buttocks." With plausibly unintentional humor the editors placed the definition right next to a lovely picture of Maria Callas. Jesse elucidates the shared etymology of "callipygous" and "callipygian" thus: "from the Greek kallos (beauty) + some word for ass." The dictionary cites the latter as pugē, though they translate it as only one cheek.