Conundrums

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A challenging puzzle or query that presents layers of difficulty and ambiguity, often requiring cleverness to resolve
2. A problem or question that is puzzling and hard to solve
3. A situation or issue that is complex and causes uncertainty or confusion

Etymology: The plural "conundrums" is simply the regular English plural of "conundrum," so the story lies with the singular. Nobody knows for certain where "conundrum" came from, which is itself part of its strangeness. It first gained popularity as a playful imitation of scholastic Latin, the dense, hair-splitting academic language of the medieval universities, placed alongside comic nonsense words such as "hocus-pocus" and "panjandrum." Its sound seems to have been valued as much as its sense. The most persuasive guess links it to the Conimbricenses, the Jesuit scholars of Coimbra, Portugal, whose sixteenth-century commentaries on Aristotle were famous for arguments that turned on the many meanings a single word could carry. A puzzle that hinges on double meanings would indeed be a "conundrum" in that sense, though the connection remains a theory rather than proven fact.

Synonyms: puzzles, riddles, mysteries, enigmas, dilemmas