His ad hominem comments on his colleague were considered egregious by those present.

Correct — B, (b) flagrant and shocking.

Two kinds of emphasis are printed in this stem and they mean different things. 'Ad hominem' is set in italic, which is the ordinary convention for a Latin phrase and is not a signal that the phrase is being tested. The word underlined - and the underline is what marks the target of the item - is 'egregious'.

Egregious means outstandingly bad; conspicuously and shockingly wrong. The word has an unusual history that explains its force. It comes from Latin egregius, from ex (out of) and grex, gregis (a flock) - literally standing out from the herd - and in older English it meant remarkably good, as in an egregious scholar. Modern usage has inverted it almost completely, so that today the word means remarkable in the wrong direction: an egregious error, an egregious breach of trust. What has survived the inversion is the conspicuousness. Egregious is never merely bad; it is bad in a way that stands out and cannot be overlooked.

'Flagrant and shocking' captures both halves of that. Flagrant means glaring, blatant, openly offensive - from Latin flagrare, to blaze - so it carries the conspicuousness; and shocking carries the moral offence taken by the observer. Together they say what the sentence says: personal attacks on a colleague, made in public, that those present found glaring and offensive.

The stem also supplies the reaction that fixes the sense. The comments 'were considered egregious by those present', so the word records the judgement of onlookers - which is the judgement 'flagrant and shocking' describes.

Why the others are wrong

• (a)extensively elaborate — 'Extensively elaborate' describes length and complexity, not offence. Its appeal is purely phonetic: 'egregious' sounds long and formal, and a candidate who does not know the word may match it to an option that sounds equally imposing. Nothing in the sentence supports the reading either - remarks that are merely detailed would not be singled out by those present, and comments described as ad hominem are by definition attacks on the person rather than lengthy arguments. The option belongs to the family of distractors built to match a word's sound and register rather than its meaning.
• (c)out of context — This is the cleverest of the three, because it is a true description of something in the sentence - just not of the underlined word. Ad hominem comments really are, in a sense, out of context: they abandon the matter under discussion and turn on the person. A candidate who has fixed on the italic Latin phrase instead of the underlined word will find this option fits, and will mark it. That is the trap the stem's two kinds of emphasis are built to set. 'Egregious' does not mean irrelevant; it means conspicuously bad, and comments can be squarely on the point and still be egregious.
• (d)impromptu and unintended — 'Impromptu and unintended' describes remarks made on the spur of the moment and without design, which is close to being an excuse for them. That is the opposite of the work 'egregious' does in the sentence: the word conveys the disapproval of those present, and it would be strange for onlookers to condemn comments by noting that they were unplanned. The two adjectives also pull against each other - impromptu describes the manner of delivery and unintended the absence of purpose - and neither has anything to do with the gravity of an offence, which is what the tested word measures.

Egregious belongs to a small group of English words whose meaning has reversed over time - what philologists call amelioration and pejoration. Egregius meant standing out from the flock, and in sixteenth-century English an egregious person was distinguished. Ironic use hollowed the praise out, and the word settled at the opposite pole. The same journey, in the other direction, has been made by words like 'nice', which once meant foolish.

What matters for an examination is that the modern word carries two components at once, and both must be present in a correct gloss:

Gravity - the thing described is bad, and seriously so. Conspicuousness - it is bad in a way that is obvious and cannot be excused or overlooked.

That second component is what separates egregious from a plain synonym for bad. An egregious error is not just a big error; it is one whose badness is apparent to everyone. This is why the word collocates with error, breach, violation, lapse, misconduct and abuse - all things that can be glaring.

A second lesson in this item concerns typography. Papers use italic for foreign phrases, book titles and emphasis, and underlining to mark the word being tested. Where both appear in one stem, the underline is the instruction and the italic is a convention. Reading the wrong one is the most avoidable way to lose a vocabulary mark, and this item's option list contains a plausible gloss for the italic phrase precisely to punish it.

Key facts

• Egregious means outstandingly and conspicuously bad; a correct gloss must carry both the gravity of the fault and the fact that it is glaring rather than hidden.
• The word comes from Latin egregius - ex (out of) and grex, gregis (a flock) - and originally meant remarkably good in English before ironic use reversed it.
• 'Flagrant' derives from Latin flagrare, to blaze, and means glaring or blatant, which is why it pairs naturally with 'shocking' to render egregious.
• 'Ad hominem' means directed at the person rather than at the argument; it is printed in italic as a Latin phrase and is not the word the item tests.
• The stem records the judgement of onlookers - the comments 'were considered egregious by those present' - so the word names a reaction of offence rather than a property of length or timing.

Common traps

• Glossing the italic Latin phrase instead of the underlined word; the option list contains a plausible description of 'ad hominem' for exactly that reason.
• Matching an imposing-sounding word to an imposing-sounding option, which is how 'extensively elaborate' catches candidates who do not know the word.
• Reading egregious as merely 'very bad' and losing the conspicuousness that separates it from ordinary badness.
• Recalling the obsolete complimentary sense and rejecting a negative gloss on the strength of it.
• Choosing an option that excuses the conduct - impromptu, unintended - when the sentence reports that those present condemned it.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The committee described the contractor's disregard of the tender conditions as an egregious breach. Here 'egregious' means :

  • (a)minor and technical
  • (b)glaring and outrageous
  • (c)repeated over many years
  • (d)difficult to prove

  Answer(b) glaring and outrageous - egregious names a fault whose badness is conspicuous. (a) reverses the gravity, (c) describes frequency rather than seriousness, and (d) describes the difficulty of establishing the breach rather than its character.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  In a printed examination stem, a word carries an underline and a nearby Latin phrase is set in italic. Which is being tested ?

  • (a)The italic phrase, because italic marks emphasis
  • (b)The underlined word, because underlining marks the target of the item
  • (c)Both, and either answer is accepted
  • (d)Neither; the emphasis is decorative

  Answer(b) The underlined word, because underlining marks the target of the item - italic is the ordinary convention for a foreign phrase or a title and carries no instruction to the candidate.