Sunday 20 March 7-by-many EMISSARY puzzle

[ridethetalk]

MAMMARIES – WTA??? I was so convinced I tried it again thinking I must have spelt it incorrectly… How else would you spell the plural of MAMMARY???

SEMIRARE – somewhat rare e.g. nickel is a semirare metal whose price has skyrocketed since Russia went to war with Ukraine. (often hyphenated)

AIRMASS/ES – a measure of the amount of air along the line of sight when observing a star or other celestial source from below Earth's atmosphere; also used extensively in meteorological circles to identify and characterize different bodies of air in the atmosphere…

REARRAY – to array again; (self explanatory)

[pat]

I too tried mammaries a second time thinking I must have mistyped it. There's no reason why it shouldn't be accepted, but possibly as a rare word since mammary is essentially an adjective and only used informally as a noun.

[TRex]

AIRMASS/ES – a measure of the amount of air along the line of sight when observing a star or other celestial source from below Earth's atmosphere; also used extensively in meteorological circles to identify and characterize different bodies of air in the atmosphere…

This weather geek has never seen air mass spelt as a single word.

https://forecast.weather.gov/glossary.php?word=air%20mass

[Alan W]

Many dictionaries have mammary as an adjective only. The online Oxford and Wiktionary list it also as a noun with plural mammaries. The OED has it as a noun with two senses: as an anatomical term for a mammary artery or vein, and "In plural. colloquial and humorous. A woman's breasts; (also, rare) those of a man." The anatomical meaning dates back to 1697, but the earliest citation for the colloquial usage is from John Steinbeck in 1947:

A visitor of another species might judge from the preoccupation of artist and audience that the seat of procreation lay in the mammaries.

I'll add mammaries as a rare word.

[Alan W]

Semirare is very rare! People normally write semi-rare. From what I can see only one dictionary, Wiktionary, acknowledges the spelling without a hyphen, But I don't feel it's used often enough to warrant being in our list.

[Alan W]

Air mass is usually written as two words, and most dictionaries list it that way only. Wiktionary allows the single-word variant. There do seem to be quite a few publications using the single-word form, as in a Denver Post weather report in May:

Then, a near record cold airmass will arrive Friday bringing a chance of snow.

I'll add airmass and airmasses as rare words.

[Alan W]

I suppose I must accept rearray, since it's in Merriam-Webster as well as Wiktionary. It seems to be used in some scientific writings in connection with molecular arrangements. In other contexts it seems to be used in sentences that have no discernable meaning. For example, in a book called Civilization and Progress:

The continual rearray of the course of progress is also a rearray of the line of battle.

And in Education and the Nature of Man

The teacher's aim is to rearray the body of experience in such a way that it will be usable to the learner and constructive in its total quality.

Anyhow, I'll add rearray, rearraying and rearrayed as rare words.

[ridethetalk]

Thanks for all of those adjudications, Alan - your careful and patient responses know no bounds...