Fantasticated

Part of speech: adjective, verb

Definitions

1. Having been shaped by the imagination into something odd, whimsical, or unreal, as an archaic verb form describing a thing dreamed up
2. Rendered whimsical or unreal through fancy, describing something that was once conjured up by an overactive or playful imagination
3. Made to seem extravagantly unreal or dreamlike, a rare and archaic description of something that has been pictured in the mind

Etymology: "Fantasticate" is a plain English formation: the adjective "fantastic" with the verb-forming ending "-ate", meaning to make or treat something in the manner of fantasy, or to imagine something in fancy. The adjective itself came into English through Middle French "fantastique" from Late Latin "phantasticus", which in turn was borrowed from Ancient Greek "phantastikos", a word for things that exist only in the mind or in appearance. That Greek adjective grew from "phantazein", "to make visible" or "to bring before the mind", linked to "phainein", "to show", which also gives us "phantom" and "phenomenon." The suffix has an older pedigree than the English word it sits on. "-ate" descends from Latin "-atus", the ending that turned nouns and adjectives into verbs or past participles, so "fantasticate" is essentially a fancy-minded adjective given a verbal form. The Greek root shows a striking reversal: a word about bringing things into view ended up describing things that are not really there.