Neat and unusual word list. Credit given to "John" from Florida for letting me add this to my page.
ADCOMSUBORDCOMPHIBSPAC is the longest acronym in the 1965 edition of the Acronyms, Initialisms, and Abbreviations Dictionary. It is a Navy term standing for Administrative Command, Amphibious Forces, Pacific Fleet Subordinate Command [Dickson].
AEGILOPS (alternate spelling of egilops, an ulcer in a part of the eye) is apparently the longest word in W2 whose letters are in alphabetical order. This word is not in W3. CHILLLOSS (the opposite of a heatloss) has its letters in alphabetical order, although this word may not be in any dictionary. [Word Ways] The title of the film EFIK MOVY was written abcdEFghIjKlMnOpqrstuVwxYz to show the alphabetical-order property. Mike Turniansky, consulting W3, says BEEFILY and BILLOWY seem to be the only current words of 7 or more letters that have the letters in alphabetic order.
AERATE, BERATE, CERATE, DERATE may be the longest such set of words [Gary Rosenberg].
ANHUNGRY is one answer to the question, "What's the other word besides 'angry' and 'hungry' that ends in 'gry'?" For some reason, this is the most frequently asked question of the editors of Merriam-Webster. Actually, "angry" and "hungry" are the only two words in common use ending in -gry, but quite a few obsolete or obscure words can be found in unabridged dictionaries. Among them are ANHUNGRY, used by Shakespeare, and AGGRY BEAD, both of which are in W3. The only -GRY words in RHUD2 are ANGRY, HUNGRY, HALF-ANGRY, OVERANGRY, and UNANGRY. Chambers has AGGRY (an adjective describing certain ancient West African beads) and AHUNGRY (oppressed with hunger). OSPD has PUGGRY (a variant form of the more usual PUGGAREE, a scarf wrapped around a sun helmet).
Beijing has three dotted letters in a row (in lower case), as do Fiji, Hajji, and hijinks. W2 has: remijia, bogijiab, pirijiri, kharijite. Four dotted letters in a row occur in Ujiji (where Stanley found Livingstone in 1871). jinjili has 5 out of 7 letters dotted. Craig Rowland reports there are four listings in the Toronto telephone directory for the surname IIJIMA, which if written in all lower case would have four dotted letters in a row.
CARES, LARGES, and PRINCES are examples of plural words that become singular words (caress, largess and princess) with another added S. Ted Clarke suggests MULTIMILLIONAIRES(S) might be the longest word that can be changed from a plural to a singular in this way.
The earliest known use of CATENARY in English is by President Thomas Jefferson. The earliest known use of MILEAGE is by Benjamin Franklin.
CATERCORNER has eight spellings in W3: catercorner, cater-cornered, catacorner, cata-cornered, catty-corner, catty-cornered, kitty-corner, and kitty-cornered. Another dictionary has cater-corner. However, Barry Harridge reports that in Chambers "the eight spellings of CATERCORNER are surpassed by the number of variants for GALLABEA which can also be spelled gallabeah,gallabia, gallabiah, gallabieh, gallabiya, gallabiyah, gallabiyeh, galabea, galabeah, galabia, galabiah, galabieh, galabiya, galabiyah, galabiyeh. "And what does it mean? Why it means a DJELLABA which can also be spelt DJELLABAH or JELLABA or JELAB -- a cloak with a hood and wide sleeves."
CHINCHERINCHEE (a south African lily) is the only word with one single letter and two letters occurring twice and three letters occurring three times.
CONSERVATIONALISTS and CONVERSATIONALISTS are the longest pair of non-scientific English words which are anagrams of each other, according to Guinness. However CONSERVATIONALIST is not generally found in dictionaries, although CONVERSATIONIST and CONSERVATIONIST are found. Craig Rowland supplied another 16-letter anagram pair: INTERNATIONALISM and INTERLAMINATIONS.
CORPS has the plural spelled the same way as the singular but pronounced differently. Other such words are CHASSIS, BOURGEOIS, SERIES, RENDEZVOUS, PINCE-NEZ, and FAUX PAS. [Keith C. Ivey in alt.usage.english and others]
CWM (a glacial hollow on a hillside) has the rare W as a vowel. Other such words: CRWTH (a type of stringed instrument), TWP (stupid), AWDL (an ode written in the strict alliterative meters), and LLWCHWR (a city-district in Wales). The OED includes numerous archaic spellings in which W or V is a vowel.
DABCHICK (a small bird) is among the very few words that contain ABC. Some others: ABCOULOMB, ABCHALAZAL, ABCAREE, CRABCAKE, DRABCLOTH, and the proper noun BABCOCK.
DORD (density) was entered into early printings of W2 by mistake. Somebody had written "d or D" as the two abbreviations for density, and somebody else thought he saw the word "dord." GOBLU and BEATOSU appeared as towns on the 1979-80 Michigan State Highway Commission map; they actually represented Go Blue! and Beat OSU, and were deleted from the 1980-81 map [Dickson].
DREAMT seems to be the only common word in English ending in -MT. Others are the obscure adreamt, undreamt, or daydreamt.
EARTHLING is first found in print in 1593. Another surprisingly old word is SPACESHIP (1894). MS. (used instead of Miss or Mrs.) has been found in 1949. Merriam-Webster researchers have found POLITICALLY CORRECT used in 1936 in In the Steps of St. Paul by H. V. Morton: "To use such words would have been equivalent to calling his audience 'slaves and robbers.' But 'Galatians,' a term that was politically correct, embraced everyone under Roman rule, from the aristocrat in Antioch to the little slave girl in Iconium." The phrase also occurs in a 1793 U. S. Supreme Court decision.
erroneousnesses and verrucosenesses are the longest words consisting of only short letters; lighttight and lillypilly are the longest consisting of only long letters. Jim Cook believes gyp is the only word consisting only of letters with descenders.
ESCALATOR is one of many words that were originally trademarks but have become ordinary words found in dictionaries. Some other words which were originally trademarks (or still are) are ASPIRIN, CELLOPHANE, CORNFLAKES, CUBE STEAK, DITTO, GUNK, HEROIN, KEROSENE, LANOLIN, MIMEOGRAPH, MOXIE, PABLUM, PHILLIPS SCREW, TABLOID, THERMOS, TRAMPOLINE, WINDBREAKER, YO-YO, ZIPPER.
ETAOIN SHRDLU is defined in W3 as "a combination of letters set by running a finger down the first and then the second left-hand vertical banks of six keys of a Linotype machine to produce a temporary marking slug not intended to appear in the final printing." The word comes from the layout of the keys on a Linotype machine. The letters also correspond exactly to the sequence of most frequently used letters found in English writing. That is, "e" is the most frequently occurring letter, followed by "t," etc., according to one study.
FABACEAE (a family of beans in some classifications) is the longest word which can also be a hexadecimal numeral (consisting only of A, B, C, D, E, and F). ACCEDED, DEFACED, and EFFACED are the longest hexadecimal words acceptable in Scrabble [Ted Clarke, Bruce D. Wilner].
FICKLEHEADED and FIDDLEDEEDEE may be the longest words consisting only of letters in the first half of the alphabet. Some shorter words are BACKFILLED, BLACKMAILED, BACKFIELD, FEEDBACK, MACADAMIA, and HIJACKED. Ted Clarke, who provided these examples, also suggests ILLEFFACEABLE, although he admits this word is not in dictionaries. Gary Rosenberg says he coined CABBAGEHEADED for this category.
FORTY is apparently the only number which has its letters in alphabetical order.
GODDESSSHIP is the only word in RHUD2 with a triple letter. This does not include some abbreviations, and words with letters separated by punctuation, such as WALL-LIKE, BELL-LESS, and GAUSS'S LAW. The UKACD has HEADMISTRESSSHIP. The Compact OED has WEEEST in a quote for the superlative of WEE. It also shows WEE-EST and WEE'ST. The OED has a triple E in SEEER (with a diaeresis over the third "e") as a rare spelling for "one who sees or beholds," the spelling designed to avoid the negative connotations that attach to a seer. (The OED also shows SEE-ER.) TUDICLA ISHIII is a species of fossil mollusk, formed by latinizing the Japanese name Ishii [Gary Rosenberg]. KAAAWA is a city in Hawaii. While watching TV news, Ted Clarke saw the name TELEEEL on a road sign in the vicinity of Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo. He also mentions that as the result of a spelling error POSTEEEN appears in Chambers Twentieth Century Dictionary 1976 reprint of its 1972 Edition. CHILLLOSS and BRASSSMITH have been suggested as words with triple letters, although neither of these is in any dictionary. FAAA is a city in Tahiti. BBBL (pronounced beVavel) is Hebrew for "in Babylon." Maßstab (German for "scale of a map") in all caps is MASSSTAB. Gary Rosenberg says SHELLLESS is "a word that I keep trying to slip into professional papers (I'm a malacologist by trade), but so far no editor has let it stand."
GOOGOL is a 1 followed by 100 zeros. Mathematician Edward Kasner supposedly asked his nephew Milton Sirotta to suggest a name for the number, and he came up with this word, which is now found in many dictionaries. The million, billion, trillion, quadrillion system skips over this number. A googolplex is 1 followed by a googol of zeros.
HONORIFICABILITUDINITATIBUS is the longest word with alternating vowels and consonants. (For information on this word, see the long words section below.) Other such words are UNIMAGINATIVELY (15 letters), VERISIMILITUDE (14 letters), and the somewhat contrived DEPOLARIZABILITY (16 letters) [Paul F. Doering]. Craig Kasper says GORAN IVANESEVIC (a top tennis player) may be the longest name of a relatively famous person that alternates consonants and vowels. UNITED ARAB EMIRATES is the longest name of a country consisting of alternating vowels and consonants.
HYDROXYZINE (a prescription drug) is the only word in RHUD2 containing XYZ.
I is the most commonly spoken word in English, followed by YOU, THE, and A. The most commonly used words in written English, according to the 1971 American Heritage Word Frequency Book are: the, of, and, a, to, in, is, you, that, it, he, for, was, on, are, as, with, his, they at, be, this, from, I, have, or, by, one, had, not, but, what, all, were, when, we there, can, an, your, which, their, said, if, do.
ICEBOX is a word with horizontal symmetry (it reflects itself across a horizontal line); some others are DECIDED, EXCEEDED, CHECKBOOK, OKEECHOBEE, HIDE, CHOICE, DIOXIDE, CEBID (a type of monkey), and OBOE. MOM, WOW, OTTO, MAAM, MA'AM, TOOT, and AHA are some words with vertical symmetry. In addition, all of the letters of these words have vertical symmetry: TIMOTHY, YOUTH, TOMATO, WITHOUT, MOTIVITY, HOMOTAXIA, HOITY-TOITY, YAWATAHAMA (a city in Japan), and MOUTH-TO-MOUTH. Some words whose letters have both horizontal and vertical symmetry are HI, OH, IO, OHIO, and OHO.
IFF is a word invented to mean "if and only if." According to MWCD10, it can be pronounced three ways: "if and only if," like "if," and like "if" but with a prolonged "F." There are 118 conjunctions in MWCD10; IFF is the only "new" conjunction, first seen in print in 1955.
IMPETICOS is an example of a nonce word (a word which has been found to have been used only once). The word is spoken by the clown in Shakespeare's Twelfth Night. W2 says perhaps it means "impocket."
INDIVISIBILITY is the shortest word in RHUD2 with 6 I's. (The plural, INDIVISIBILITIES, would have 7 I's.) NONANNOUNCEMENT has 6 N's.
INTESTINES has each of its letters occurring twice. Some other such words: APPEASES, CAUCASUS, HOTSHOTS, ARRAIGNING, TEAMMATE, SHANGHAIINGS, REAPPEAR, HAPPENCHANCE, HORSESHOER, and ESOPHAGOGRAPHERS.
IO (an interjection in Chambers and one of the moons of Jupiter), AI (the three-toed sloth), EO, and AA (rough volcanic rock) seem to be the shortest two-syllable words.
IRAQ is one of the very few words ending in Q. Obscure words ending in Q are: SHOQ, PONTACQ, INUPIAQ (an Eskimo people), SUQ, ZAQAZIQ (or ZAGAZIG, a city in Egypt), ZIA-UL-HAQ (a proper name), and NOASTALIQ. Chambers has TALAQ and TZADDIQ (which can also be spelled TSADDIQ). OSPD has TRANQ and UMIAQ, although these words are not in W2 or W3. (I presume UMIAQ is another spelling for UMIAK, an Eskimo boat, which is in W2 and W3.)
JAAAARNE is an Estonian word meaning "the edge of the ice." It has four A's in a row. (There is an umlaut above each A.) [Guinness]
KÄRNTEN (one of the states of Austria) is suggested by Pierre Abbat as perhaps the longest word consisting of alternating dits and dahs in Morse code (_._ ._._ ._. _. _ . _.)
KINE (an archaic plural of COW) qualifies as a plural that shares no letters in common with its singular.
KYRKY is the Chukchi word for "walrus." The word is pronounced "KYRKY" by men but "TSYTSTSY" by women because of a curious feature of the Chukchi language: K is pronounced "K" by men but "TS" by women; "RK" is pronounced "RK" by men but "TSTS" by women. [Languages of the World, by Kenneth Katzner.]
LATCHSTRING, CATCHPHRASE, BORSCHTS, BERGSCHRUND, KNIGHTSBRIDGE (a district in London), and ESCHSCHOLTZIA (a genus of poppies) have six consonants in a row. John F. Underwood suggests that BORSCHTS may be the only instance in English of six successive consonants in one syllable. THUMBSCREW may have the longest string of consecutive consonants without using a letter twice (Craig Kasper). The Dutch word ANGSTSCHREEUW (a scream of anguish), the German word ANGSTSCHWEISS and the Swedish word VARLDSSCHLAGER (=a kind of world music; an umlaut over the first A) all have 8 consecutive consonants.
MASSACRING has more pronounced syllables than vowels [Wei-Hwa Huang]. Some other such words are EDINBURGH [Nick Wedd], RHYTHM, CHASM, and VRBAITE (a mineral named for Karel Vrba).
MHO is the unit of electrical conductance. Since conductance is the reciprocal of resistance, which is measured in ohms, MHO is OHM spelled backwards. The only other word in MWCD10 the origin of which is a backwards spelling is YOB, now more commonly spelled yobbo, which is the backwards spelling of boy. However, Chambers has two other electrical units formed by backwards spellings: DARAF and YRNEH. Barry Harridge, consulting Chambers, says, "A close relative is EGALLIC (pertaining to gall-nuts, applied to a particular acid). The coiners of the word started with the French word for gall (galle) and spelt it backwards. The laxative SERUTAN was named by spelling natures backwards.
MOMMY TRACK is one of the newest words in MWCD10, dated to 1989. The other newest words are: codependence, letterboxed, and virtual reality (all 1989), fullerene and tropical oil (both 1988), channeler, codependency, lovastatin, polymerase chain reaction, and zidovudine (all 1987).
MUZZ would, according to Paul Dickson, be the last word in the Random House Dictionary if all the words in the dictionary were spelled backwards. However, it would seem that the last word in this dictionary, ZZZ, would remain last.
OF is apparently the only word in which an F is pronounced like a V.
ONE THOUSAND contains the letter A, but none of the words from one to nine hundred ninety-nine has an A.
The shortest -ology (study of) word is OOLOGY (the study of eggs).
It is said that no word rhymes with ORANGE. There is even a musical recording Rhymes With Orange by Mario Grigorov, and Witchiepoo sang There Ain't No Rhyme for Oranges on H. R. Pufnstuf. However, Bruce Todd points out that the final syllable of CITRANGE is pronounced identically with the final syllable of ORANGE, and W3 shows an alternate pronunciation of SYRINGE which is also identical in the last syllable. BLORENGE (a 1,833 ft. hill near Abergavenny, Wales) is given in O. V. Michaelson's book Words At Play. SPORANGE looks as if it rhymes, but neither pronunciation for this word in W3 would qualify as a rhyme. Ng Boon Leong says that as English is pronounced in Singapore, RANGE, STONEHENGE, and DERANGE all rhyme with ORANGE.
Some other words difficult to rhyme are MONTH, SILVER, WASP, and PURPLE. The rec.puzzles archive has (n + 1)th to rhyme with MONTH, and words such as SEVENTH, ELEVENTH, and THOUSANDTH could be considered rhymes. Ted Clarke provides CHILVER (British dialect for "ewe lamb" or "ewe mutton" and a surname) and GRUNTH (an alternate spelling of GRANTH) which rhymes with MONTH in one of its pronunciations. HIRPLE is a British word meaning "walk lamely" or "hobble." WILVER is a surname and the nickname of baseball player Willie Stargell.
ORANGERY has been suggested as the longest word which remains a word with each successive letter taken off the right side. However, Ted Clarke reports that COMPOSERS yields COMPOSER, COMPOSE, COMPOS, COMPO, COMP, COM, and CO. He has also found at least two instances of the word COMPOSTE in the OED, so that COMPOSTERS yields COMPOSTER, COMPOSTE, COMPOST, COMPOS, COMPO, COMP, COM, and CO.
It is claimed that -OUGH can be pronounced 9 different ways in the following sentence:
A rough-coated, dough-faced, thoughtful ploughman strode through the streets of Scarborough; after falling into a slough, he coughed and hiccoughed.
However, David Olsen says that slough does not provide a unique pronunciation for -ough, but that HOUGH (pronounced hock) is a Scottish word, meaning the ankle joint of a horse, cow, or foul, or to hamstring, or it is an obsolete British word meaning to clear the throat. Olsen says that in order for the sentence to have 9 different ways of pronouncing -ough, it could be rewritten as:
A rough-coated, dough-faced, thoughtful ploughman strode the streets of Scarborough; after falling into a slough, he coughed, houghed, and hiccoughed.
Ted Clarke says there are 10 pronunciations for OUGH. He adds LOUGH, the Irish form of loch. But James A. Landau reports that the YOUGHIOGHENY River in Pennsylvania (a tributary of the Monongahela) is pronounced "YUCK-ih-gain-ee."
OVERSTUFF, OVERSTUDY, and UNDERSTUDY contain the alphabetical sequence -rstu-. The only other four-letter alphabetical sequence found in English is -mnop-, which is found in LIMNOPHILOUS, GYMNOPAEDES, GYMNOPAEDIC, GYMNOPHIONA, GYMNOPHIONA, GYMNOPHTHALMATA, GYMNOPLAST, PRUMNOPITYS, SEMNOPITHECUS, SOMNOPATHY, THAMNOPHILE, THAMNOPHILUS, and THAMNOPHIS. If we allow spaces and hyphens there are also FILM NOIR and STAR-STUDDED. Jim Cook says WEAPONMAKING and (WEAPONMAKER), which contain -mnop- backwards, are probably the only words containing a four-letter sequence that is exactly in reversed alphabetical order. HIJIKI (a type of seaweed) is a 6-letter word consisting only of the sequence H, I, J, K.
OXYOPIA (unusual acuteness of vision) and OCEANIA cram five syllables into only seven letters. OIDIA (plural of OIDIUM) has four syllables with only five letters [Craig Rowland]. Barry Harridge points out that IFF (described elsewhere on this page) yields five syllables with only three letters, in one of its pronunciations.
PIKES PEAK is spelled without an apostrophe by law. The Colorado legislature established the correct spelling in 1978. There are other cases in which spelling established by law. The voters of Mullens, West Virginia, voted to retain the spelling, rather than switch to "Mullins," which is how the person for whom the town is named spelled his name. According to Willis Johnson, the Louisiana legislature enacted a law specifying that "crawfish" should not be spelled with a "y".
PINK has a separate entry for each of eight completely different etymologies in Chambers. (Briefly they are a ship, to serrate, light red, yellow pigment, to wink, small, a minnow, to knock in a car's engine.)
POLISH is pronounced two ways, depending on whether or not the first letter is capitalized. Some other such words: JOB, LIMA, and READING.
PSI and SAI make up a pair of homophones, both of which refer to pitchfork-shaped objects. The first is Greek and refers to a letter; the second is Japanese and refers to a ninja weapon. (In Greek, PSI is pronounced "psee," but in English-language dictionaries it is pronounced "sai.")
RAISE/RAZE are homophones with approximately opposite meanings. Others are RECKLESS/WRECKLESS, AURAL/ORAL, PETALLESS/PETALOUS.
SCRAUNCHED may be the longest monosyllabic word in W3. Slightly shorter monosyllabic words are SCRATCHED, SCREECHED, SQUELCHED, STRAIGHTS, and STRENGTHS. Craig Rowland suggests SQUIRRELLED. He writes, "All dictionaries designate this word to be of two syllables, but frankly I don't know any Canadian who says it as any way but one."
SET is the word with the longest entry in the OED and W3. In the OED2, the verb set has over 430 senses consisting of approximately 60,000 words.
SUBBOOKKEEPER is the only word with four pairs of double letters in a row. This word is in W2, but not W3.
[Bob Erndt suggests there ought to be someone who has a raccoon that has a nook that needs cleaning, namely a RACCOONNOOKKEEPER. And from Bo Parker: At a dam, there is a flooddoor. The controls for the flooddoor are in the flooddoorroom. Let's say the the boss at the dam calls a meeting in the flooddoorroom. The people who go to this meeting are FLOODDOORROOMMEETINGGOERS.]
SYZYGY and ZYZZYVA, when written in cursive, have five letters in a row which descend below the line. SYZYGY is also the shortest word with three Y's.
TARAMASALATA (a type of Greek salad) has an A for every other letter. OCONOMOWOC (a town in Wisconsin) has an O for every other letter.
TATTARATTAT is the longest palindrome appearing in the OED2; KINNIKINNIK is the longest in W3. DETARTRATED is listed by Guinness, although it is described therein as "a contrived chemical term." REDIVIDER may be the longest palindrome in common use. WASSAMASSAW Road is located near Summerville, South Carolina. The Finnish word SAIPPUAKIVIKAUPPIAS (a soapstone seller) is the longest known palindrome in any language according to the Guinness Book of World Records. However, the Swedish word PORTUGALRALLARLAGUTROP (22 letters) is listed in Guinness, Swedish 1989 edition; the word, however, is not found in dictionaries. The northernmost palindrome is QAANAAQ (the administrative capital of Northern Greenland). SOS by ABBA was a hit recording with a palindromic title and artist. Ole ELO was apparently the first palindromic album title (by the Electric Light Orchestra).
TAXI is spelled the same way in nine languages, according to Dixon: English, French, German, Swedish, Spanish, Danish, Norwegian, Dutch, and Portuguese. Jeff Volgyi reports it is also spelled the same way in Hungarian. However, Emerson Werneck says that in Portuguese, taxi is actually spelled táxi. He points out that SAUNA is spelled the same way in nine languages: Finnish, English, Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, French, German, Dutch, and Danish.
THERBLIG, a unit of workplace efficiency, is a word created by spelling approximately backwards the last name of engineer Frank B. Gilbreth and psychologist Lillian Gilbreth. THERBLIG is not in MWCD10; the three words in MWCD10 that were created as anagrams are SPANDEX (for "expands"), SIDEBURNS (for "burnsides"), and ITACONIC ACID (for "aconitic acid," from "aconite.")
THEREIN is a seven-letter word that contains eleven words spelled with consecutive letters: the, he, her, here, there, ere, rein, re, in, therein, and herein. SHADES contains hades, shade; ades, hade, shad; des, ade, had, sha; es, de, ad, ha, sh; S, E, D, A, H, all of which are in W3. ["Word Torture," by Ralph Beaman, Word Ways.]
TOUGH, THOUGH, THROUGH, THOROUGH are formed adding a letter every time between T and OUGH, but none of them rhymes with any other.
TROLLIED seems to be the longest word in W3 with the letters in reverse alphabetical order. There are also SPOON-FEED and SPOON-FED, although these words are usually spelled with hyphens.
UH-UH, meaning "no," is most commonly spelled UH-UH. The following was posted in the Merriam-Webster message board on AOL on 4/3/97:
We got a letter a couple of years ago in the Merriam-Webster office from a court reporter looking for guidance on how to transcribe the sound of negation sometimes indicated by "uh-uh." She said she knew many court reporters who indicated it differently, leading to transcriptions of courtroom proceedings that were potentially difficult to interpret.
What we've found in our research is that "uh-uh" is by far the most commonly used spelling for this sound used for "no" in edited text. It is about four times as common as the next runner-up, "unh-unh." We also have one example of the use of "un-huh." So it looks like "uh-uh" is as close as we're going to get for now to a "standard" on this.
UNCOPYRIGHTABLE is the longest word in common use with no letter appearing more than once. Other such words are SUBDERMATOGLYPHIC (not found in any dictionary, but occurring in an article in Annals of Dermatology), MISCONJUGATEDLY, AMBIDEXTROUSLY, DERMATOGLYPHICS, SCHIZOTRYPANUM, VESICULOGRAPHY (these three are found in Stedman's electronic medical dictionary), BRICKLEHAMPTON (a village in Britain near Evesham), UNDISCOVERABLY, BENZHYDROXAMIC, HYDROMAGNETICS, HYDROPNEUMATIC, PSEUDOMYTHICAL, SULPHOGERMANIC.
UNPROSPEROUSNESS is the longest word in which no letter occurs only once.
UNUNUNIUM (provisional name for Element 111) is one of the few words with a sequence of letters three times in a row. Others are: the name LEKKERKERKER and Mohottiwatte GUNANANA (a Buddhist High Priest in the late 1800s) [Pierre Abbat].
USHER contains four personal pronouns (us, she, he, her).
UVULAPALATOPHARANGOPLASTY is the longest word that does not contain an E. E is the most frequently occurring letter in English (and French, Spanish, and German). Mark Smith reports the word refers to a surgical procedure for (most commonly) men with advanced sleep apnea, wherein the breathing passage is opened by removing the uvula, shortening the palate and removing the tonsils. Other long words lacking an E are HUMUHUMUNUKUNUKUAPUAAS, PHONOCARDIOGRAPHICALLY, PRORHIPIDOGLOSSOMORPHA, SUPRADIAPHRAGMATICALLY, and MACRACANTHORHYNCHIASIS.
WACO and WARE are the only U. S. radio station call letters that exactly spelled the cities in which they were located (Waco, Texas, and Ware, Massachusetts). WHT in Deerfield, Illinois, and WGHF in New York were apparently the only radio call letters that exactly matched the owners' initials (Chicago Mayor William Hale Thompson and William G. H. Finch). Television station WRGB in Schenectady was named for GE executive Walter R. G. Baker.
There is only one word beginning with X in Noah Webster's first dictionary, A Compendious Dictionary of the English Language (1806). The word is XEBEC.
VOWELS
The shortest words with the five vowels in any order are SEQUOIA, EULOGIA, MIAOUED, ADOULIE, EUCOSIA, EUNOMIA, EUTOPIA, MOINEAU, and DOULEIA. DOULEIA is an alternate spelling of DULIA (a form of veneration of saints) which appears in W2. OISEAU (bird) is the shortest word in French with the five vowels [Andreas Parsch].
The shortest word with the vowels in alphabetical order is CAESIOUS (light blue), with eight letters. Some other such words are ACHEILOUS, ACHEIROUS, AEROBIOUS, ARSENIOUS, ARTERIOUS, AUTECIOUS, ABSTEMIOUS, ANNELIDOUS, and FACETIOUS. Pierre Abbat says ACEITOU (Portuguese for past tense of to accept) and ALEIJOU (Portuguese for past tense of paralyze) are the shortest words he knows in any language written in the Roman alphabet which have all five vowels in order. PANCREATICODUODENOSTOMY is the longest word with all six vowels in order.
Gary Rosenberg says PSEUDOPSEUDOHYPOPARATHYROIDISM (which is in OED2) is the only word he knows of with all the vowels twice.
SUOIDEA (the taxonomic group to which pigs belong) is the shortest word with the vowels in reverse alphabetical order [Gary Rosenberg]. Some other such words are SUBCONTINENTAL, DUOLITERAL, and UNCOMPLIMENTARY.
Words consisting entirely of vowels include AA (a type of lava) IAO, OII, EUOUAE, OO, I, O, A, and IO, which is an interjection in Chambers in addition to being one of the moons of Jupiter. AIEA is a city in Hawaii. OO means "wool" (Scottish). The OED has the interjection AIEEE. Chambers has AI (thee three-toed sloth). The scientific name of the roseate spoonbill is AJAIA AJAIA (or AJAIA AJAJA); however, the J's would have been I's in the original Latin spelling, so that the words would consist entirely of vowels also. EA is a town in the Basque section of Spain. If Y is allowed, there are: AYE, AYU, EYE, IYO, EYEY, and YAYA (although I am not sure which of these Y's are vowels!).
Words containing no vowels include Q.T. (as in "on the q.t.") and DJ, both of which appear in the main part of MWCD10 and not in the abbreviations section. Other such words include BRRRRR, ZZZ, NTH, SSSHHHHH, HMMMM, PHT, TSKTSK, YHWH, JHVH, MR., MRS., MS, GRR, PSST, and pH (measure of acidity/alkalinity). John Chew reports that OSPD has a seven-letter word with neither vowels nor semivowels: TSKTSKS, a verb, meaning "to say 'Tsk, tsk.'" SSSSSSS is the title of a 1973 movie.
Richard VLK of Pittsburgh profited from a vowelless last name in 1983 when he won over $20,000 by finding enough flip tops from Pepsi cans to spell his name 1,393 times.
Strch prst skrz krk (Czech for "Put your finger through your throat") appears to have no vowels, but R serves as a vowel in Czech. Bydd y cyllyll yn y cwpwrdd wrth y bwrdd (Welsh for "The knives will be in the cupboard by the table") does not use the vowels a, e, i, o, and u.
The longest common word without an A, E, I, O, or U is RHYTHMS, but these additional words appear in W2: SYMPHYSY, NYMPHLY, GYPSYRY, GYPSYFY. The OED2 has TWYNDYLLYNG(S). Collins has POLYRHYTHM(S). And WPPWRMWSTE (in the OED) goes nine letters without an A, E, I, O, or U; GLYCYRRHIZIN (a constituent of licorice) goes eight letters without A, E, I, O, or U. (In all these words, "Y" is a vowel.)
The longest word with one vowel is STRENGTHS. STRENGTHLESSNESS and DEFENSELESSNESS are the longest words with one vowel if allowed to repeat. Some shorter words with one vowel, allowed to repeat, are BEEKEEPER, RETELEMETERED, DEGENERESCENCE, TARAMASALATA (a type of Greek salad), OCONOMOWOC (a town in Wisconsin), ASARABACCA, MISSISSIPPI, and perhaps EYELETEERS (which is in OSW although I am unsure whether the Y is a vowel). EFFERVESCENCE has only one distinct vowel, and all the E's are evenly spaced.
The word with the most consecutive vowels (six) is EUOUAE, which is in W2 but not W3. W2 defines EUOUAE as "A word formed from the vowels of seculorum amen, ending the Gloria Patri." Words with five consecutive vowels include QUEUEING (used in the mathematics term "queueing theory"), the interjection AIEEE, which is in the OED, and COOEEING. (COOEE or COOEY, a peculiar cry of the Australian aborigine, is in W1, W2, and W3. The word is also a verb and both W1 and W2 show the forms COOEEING and COOEEYING.) MIAOUED (past tense of what a cat does) has five consecutive vowels but this spelling is not generally found in dictionaries.
Craig Rowland reports that in Quebec, there is a region known as the Outaouais, which, if in adjectival form, becomes lowercase, hence outaouais. The feminine form of this adjective is OUTAOUAISE, making it an eight-vowelled ten-letter word. He also says that in Quebecois French, the word for bullfrog is OUAOUARON, with six vowels in a row.
Allowing proper nouns, URU-EU-UAU-UAU (a language of Brazil with about 100 speakers in 1995; also spelled URUEWAWAU or ERU-EU-WAU-WAU) has nine vowels in a row, ignoring hyphens. OUAOUIATON (six vowels in a row) appears on a French map of the central part of North America printed in 1693. The word was later shortened to OUAOUIA, and was applied to the Indian tribe subsequently called Iowa. [The Book of Names, J. N. Hook.] IJOUAOUOUENE, a mountain in Morocco, has eight consecutive vowels as rendered by the French [Guinness]. The ZOUAOUA are a Kabyli tribe living in Algeria and Morocco.
The Dutch word KOEIEUIER (the udder of a cow) has seven vowels in a row. Gert Florijn says this word is "a well-known example in Dutch recreational linguistics. However, we had a spelling-reform last, and I'm not sure this one survived. It should have, anyway." The newer spelling of the word is KOEIENUIER. The Dutch word PAPEGAAIEEIEREN (an umlaut on the second e between the i's) (parrot eggs) also has seven vowels, although this word should now be spelled PAPEGAAIENEIEREN with the new rules. [Joost Gestel] Tom Vernooij states the following about the new spelling rules: "At least the words are valid for two years since the new spelling is introduced. Because the intermedium period is valid for a period of two years . After this period only the words according the new spelling are valid. So, for the time being there are two official versions."
HAAYOAIE, a Finnish word for "a plan for the wedding night," has 7 consecutive vowels, and 6 of the 8 vowel sounds that exist in Finnish (there is an umlaut above the first two A's and the O). [Tapio Tallgren].
Gary Rosenberg suggests that QUACKSALVER and QUICKSILVER may be the longest pair of words related by changing two identical vowels to a different set of identical vowels.
UNCOMMON DOUBLE LETTERS
HH is found in withhold, bathhouse, beachhead, fishhook, highhanded, hitchhike, roughhouse, washhouse, watchhouse, aarrghh, hashhead, roughhew, fleshhood, roughhewn, touchhole, youthhood, youthhead, sleuthhound, and Pochhammer symbol.
JJ is found in AVIJJA, ZU'L-HIJJAH or DHU'L-HIJJAH (the twelfth month of the Muslim calendar), HAJJ (the Muslim pilgrimage), HAJJI, and UJJAIN (one of the holy cities of India).
QQ appears in ZAQQUM, SAQQARA (a village in Egypt), and ZIQQURAT (an alternate spelling of zikkurat or ziggurat used in past editions of Guinness).
VV. The complete list from the UKACD: civvy, divvy, navvy, savvy, bovver, chivvy, luvvie, revved, skivvy, spivvy, chivved, civvies, divvied, divvies, flivver, luvvies, navvied, navvies, revving, savvied, savvies, shivved, chivvied, chivvies, chivving, divvying, flivvers, navvying, savvying, shivving, skivvies, bovver boy, chivvying, bovver boys, steam-navvy, bovver boots, civvy street, improvvisatore. Other words with a double V not in that dictionary are bivvy (slang for bivouac) and bivver (a variant of bever). Chambers has devvel, bevvy, bivvy, and crivvens.
XX occurs in no English words (excluding proper nouns). EXXON, FOXX, MAXXAM, and LEXXEL (a new prescription drug) are all proper names. XX is the only double letter combination not found in English. According to an article in Time, the name Exxon was chosen partly because it meant nothing in any language and the article reported researchers concluded that XX occurs in no language. However, Bruce D. Wilner informs me that the sign on the Maltese embassy in Washington, D. C., reads Ambaxxata da Malta, so apparently Maltese has a double X. According to Languages of the World by Kenneth Katzner, X in Maltese is pronounced like "sh." Even two X's separated by one letter is rare; only one such word appears in the RHUD2: MAXIXE (a Brazilian dance), although Jim Cook has found XAXIM (a town in Brazil or a fern trunk fiber used as a potting soil).
YY occurs in SNARLEYYOW (slang for "dog"; found in W2), GAYYOU, AYYUBID, CUBBYYEW, SAYYID (a descendant of Muhammad through Hussein), OMAYYAD or UMAYYAD, AL-UBAYYID, IYYAR (an alternate spelling of Iyar, a month in the Jewish calendar), KHAYYAM, NABEREZHNYYE CHELNY (an alternate spelling for the name of a Russian port), PIYYUT (a liturgical poem in Judaism), YABLONOVYY (a Russian mountain range), and ZAKIYYA (an alternate spelling for a female given name.) In addition, in the American Heritage Dictionary on CD-rom BODYBUILDER is misspelled as BODYYBUILDER.
TYPEWRITER WORDS
AFTERCATARACTS (plural for a condition that sometimes follows cataract surgery) and TESSERADECADES are the longest words which can be typed using only the fingers of the left hand. The first word appears in a Merriam-Webster medical dictionary; the second is in W2. Other such words (some of which are not in dictionaries) are STEWARDESSES, DESEGREGATED, DESEGREGATES, REVERBERATES, WATERCRESSES, AFTEREFFECTS, DECEREBRATED, EXTRAVASTATE, GAZETTEER, REASSEVERATE, TERRACEWARDS, DEVERTEBRATED, and REVERBERATED.
JOHNNY-JUMP-UP (a fast-growing flower or a brand name for a type of toy) is the longest word found in abridged dictionaries that can be typed using only the fingers of the right hand. Other such words (some of which are not in dictionaries) are LOLLIPOP, POLYPHONY, PHYLLOPHYLLIN, MIMINYPIMINY, HOMOPHONY, HOMOPHYLY, NONILLION, POLLONIUM, POLLINIUM, POLYONOMY, HYPOPHYLLIUM, HYPOLIMNION, HYPOPHYLL, LUPULINUM, MINIKINLY, MONOPHONY, NIPPONIUM, and IKINNIKINNIK.
TYPEWRITER can be typed using only the top row of keys on the keyboard. The following ten-letter words with this feature all appear in W2: PEPPERROOT, PEPPERWORT, PEWTERWORT, PIROUETTER, PREREQUIRE, PRETORTURE, PROPRIETOR, REPERTOIRE, REPETITORY, TETTERWORT. These words have also been suggested: PROPRIETORY, PROTEROTYPE, RUPTUREWORT, PITUITOTROPE, UROPYOURETER, PERPETUITY.
The only word which can be typed using the bottom row of letters is ZZZ (to indicate sleeping), which is found in at least one dictionary. There are no vowels in the bottom row.
SHAKALSHAS (plural of Shakalsha, a people emigrating from Phrygia and colonizing Sicily in early times) is the longest word which can be typed using only the middle row of letters on the keyboard. Other such words: FLAGFALLS, HADASSAHS, GALAGALA, GALAHADS, HASKALAH, and ALFALFAS.
DEEDED can be typed using one finger. Some other such words: HUMHUM, HUMMUM, MUHUHU, ZZZ, ECCE, CEDED, MUMMY, UNNUN, YUMMY, YUMYUM, and MUUMUU.
DISMANTLEMENT is typed by alternating the use of both hands. Other such words are LEPTOTHRICOSIS, SKEPTICISMS, ANTIENDOWMENT, ANTISUDORIFIC, AUTOTOXICOSIS, NEUROTOXICITY, and LEUCOCYTOZOANS.
POSTMUSCULAR is the longest word typed using alternating hands, two letters at a time.
SOME COMMON MISSPELLINGS
The words most likely to be misspelled (ratio of incorrect to correct spellings) according to a recent study of Usenet traffic were DUMBBELL, OCCURRENCE, MEMENTO, FRUSTUM, COLLECTIBLE, AMATEUR, DAIQUIRI, PASTIME, ACCIDENTALLY, PLAYWRIGHT, EMBARRASS, ACQUIT, HARASS, and PRONUNCIATION.
The same study showed these words most frequently misspelled (by gross count): RECEIVE, A LOT, AMATEUR, SEPARATE, REALIZE, THEIR, DEFINITE, INDEPENDENT, WEIRD, EMBARRASS, ARGUMENT, NO ONE, ACQUIRE, ACCIDENTALLY, OCCURRENCE, COLLECTIBLE, RIDICULOUS, MANEUVER, LIAISON, GAUGE, ATHEIST, GRAMMAR, SUPERSEDE, KERNEL, and CONSENSUS.
The study does not reveal common errors such as IT'S/ITS and YOUR/YOU'RE. Some other commonly misspelled words are BARBECUE, UKULELE, BICEPS, RESTAURATEUR, and MINUSCULE, although some dictionaries also give "ukelele" and "miniscule." Chambers has "barbeque." In Samuel Johnson's abridged 1843 Edition of his dictionary, frustum is misspelled as "frustrum." CALENDAR is misspelled when used as the title of a chart in Noah Webster's first dictionary, and spelled correctly elsewhere on the same page. (There is, however, an unrelated word "calender.")
BEAUTIFUL (AND NOT-SO-BEAUTIFUL) WORDS
Wilfred Funk's list of the most beautiful words in English: ASPHODEL, FAWN, DAWN, CHALICE, ANEMONE, TRANQUIL, HUSH, GOLDEN, HALCYON, CAMELLIA, BOBOLINK, THRUSH, CHIMES, MURMURING, LULLABY, LUMINOUS, DAMASK, CERULEAN, MELODY, MARIGOLD, JONQUIL, ORIOLE, TENDRIL, MYRRH, MIGNONETTE, GOSSAMER, ALYSSEUM, MIST, OLEANDER, AMARYLLIS, ROSEMARY. [Alysseum may be a misspelling of alyssum, but this is how the word appears in Paul Dickson's Words.]
According to James Joyce, CUSPIDOR is the most beautiful word in English [Dickson].
Annie Dillard, in Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, nominated SYCAMORE as the most beautiful word in English.
The ten worst-sounding words in English, according to a poll by the National Association of Teachers of Speech in August, 1946: CACOPHONY, CRUNCH, FLATULENT, GRIPE, JAZZ, PHLEGMATIC, PLUMP, PLUTOCRAT, SAP, and TREACHERY.
According to Willard R. Espy, the ten ugliest-sounding words in English, excluding indecent words, are FRUCTIFY, KUMQUAT, QUAHOG, CREPUSCULAR, KAKKAK, GARGOYLE, CACOPHONOUS, AASVOGEL, BROBDINGNAGIAN, JUKEBOX [The Book of Lists: The '90s Edition].
VICTUALS (pronounced "viddles") is the ugliest word in the language according to Harry Golden [Dickson].
NYNEX was deemed to be the worst name of any company in America by the publisher of Advertising Age [Dickson].
LONG WORDS
PNEUMONOULTRAMICROSCOPICSILICOVOLCANOCONIOSIS, with 45 letters, is the longest word in any English-language dictionary. The word is in W3, OED2, RHUD2, and Chambers.
FLOCCINAUCINIHILIPILIFICATION (an estimation of something as worthless) is the longest word in the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary. (The second edition has a longer word.) The word has been used by Sir Walter Scott, Senators Robert Byrd and Daniel Patrick Moynihan. It also appeared on March 14, 1996, in "Zippy," a comic strip distributed by King Features Syndicate: "Do you think I may be too quick to find fault with things and people, Zippy?" // "Yeh." // "Th' 'floccinaucinihilipilification' process." // "Th' what?" // "Floccinaucinihilipilification!! It means 'the estimation of something as valueless'!" // "You've been randomly reading th' dictionary, haven't you?" // "Yes. That and my natural tendency toward antifloccinaucinihilipilification!!" Floccinaucinihilipilification was also used by Press Secretary Mike McCurry in his December 6, 1995, White House Press Briefing in discussing Congressional Budget Office estimates and assumptions: "But if you -- as a practical matter of estimating the economy, the difference is not great. There's a little bit of floccinaucinihilipilification going on here."
CYSTOURETEROPYELONEPHRITIS (26 letters; a combined inflammation of the urinary bladder, ureters, and kidneys) is a long medical term mentioned by Paul Hellweg in The Insomniac's Dictionary.
ELECTROENCEPHALOGRAPHICALLY and ETHYLENEDIAMINETETRAACETATE (28 letters) are the longest words without spaces or hyphens in MWCD10.
HEPATICOCHOLANGIOCHOLECYSTENTEROSTOMIES is the longest word in Gould's Medical Dictionary.
ORIFICABILITUDINITATIBUS (honorableness) is the longest word used by Shakespeare. It appears in Love's Labour's Lost, Act V, Scene 1. W2 says it is a "pedantic nonsense word." It is the ablative plural of the Latin honorificabilitudintas, which is an extension of honorificabilis meaning "honorableness." It first occurs in English in 1599, used by Thomas Nashe. The word does not appear in W3. [Note: for those who have previously saved this page, this word was misspelled prior to 8/19/97.] The letter can be rearranged to give "Hi ludi F. Baconis nati tuiti orbi," meaning, "These plays, F. Bacon's offspring, are preserved for the world." This fact has been cited by proponents of the theory that Francis Bacon actually wrote Shakespeare's plays.
SUPEREXTRAORDINARISIMO is the longest word in Spanish, according to Guinness 1995. However, the legitimacy of this word is open to dispute. Nidia Cobiella points out that there are numerous similarly-formed questionable words, such as superextraordinariamente, superespectacularisimo, otorrinolaringologistico, endocrinologicamente, apesadumbradisimamente, descontaminadamente, requeterequeteacostumbrado, sobreabundantisimamente, superimaginariamente, superexcelentisimamente, superpsicoanalisticamente, and desconsideradisimamente. SUPERCALIFRAGILISTICOESPIALIDOSO (from Mary Poppins) has also been suggested. The legitimate words OTORRINOLARINGOLOGIA and OTORRINOLARINGOLOGO could also lead to superotorrinolaringologo and superotorrinolaringologisimo.
ANTICONSTITUTIONNELLEMENT is the longest official word in French, according to Jacques Raymond Kilchoër.
SUPERCALIFRAGILISTICEXPIALIDOCIOUS from the movie Mary Poppins is not the longest word in English, although many people believe it is. The word is in the OED, which has the following as the first four citations:
1949 Parker & Young (unpublished song-title) Supercalafajalistickespialadojus.
1951 Parker & Young (song-title) Supercalafajalistickespeealadojus; or, The super song.
1964 R. M. & R. B; Sherman (song-title) Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious!
1967 Decisions U.S. Courts involving Copyright 1965-66 488 The complaint alleges copyright infringement of plaintiff's song `Supercalafajalistickespeealadojus' by defendants' song 'Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.' (All variants of this tongue twister will hereinafter be referred to collectively as 'the word'.)
(The definition says Disney won, "in view of earlier oral uses of the word sworn to in affidavits" and because they wrote the rest of the song themselves.)
SMILES is supposed to be the longest word in the dictionary because "there's a mile between the two S's." Randal J. May points out that adding one letter to SMILE adds two syllables (in forming SIMILE).
According to Red Skelton, the longest word is the word that follows the announcement, "And now a word from our sponsor"!
LONG WORDS - PLACE NAMES
LLANFAIRPWLLGWYNGYLLGOGERYCHWYRNDROBWLLLLANTYSILIOGOGOGOCH is according to one source the longest placename in the world, with 58 letters. It is a town in North Wales meaning "St. Mary's Church in the hollow of the white hazel near to the rapid whirlpool of Llantysilio of the red cave" or "St. Mary's (Church) by the white aspen over the whirlpool, and St. Tysilio's (Church) by the red cave" in Welsh.
Dale Williams of New Zealand says that the Welsh placename is a nineteenth-century fabrication, adopted to look good on their railway place boards, whereas a Maori name for a hill in New Zealand is genuine and was in general use. It has 85 letters: TAUMATAWHAKATANGIHANGAKOAUAUTAMATEATURIPUKAKAPIKI- MAUNGAHORONUKUPOKAIWHENUAKITANATAHU. Williams says, "If we want to go there now we call it Taumata." New Zealand broadcaster Henare Te Ua says the word celebrates the prowess of a great Maori chief who possessed enormous personal power. Chief Tamatea was so mighty and powerful that, metaphorically, he could even eat mountains. There was a gentle side to his personality too. He could play his nose flute beautifully and quite charmingly to his loved ones. The word, Henare said, means "The summit of the hill, where Tamatea, who is known as the land eater, slid down, climbed up and swallowed mountains, played on his nose flute to his loved one." The hill, about 1000 feet in height, is in Southern Hawke's Bay, a district on the eastern side of the north island. [Neil Carleton]
There is a 66-letter place name in Wales, according to Dr. David Crystal's Encyclopedia of Language: GORSAFAWDDACHAIDRAIGODANHEDDOGLEDDOLONPENRHYNAREURDRAETHCEREDIGION, meaning "the Mawddach station and its dragon teeth at the Northern Penrhyn Road on the golden beach of Cardigan bay."
According to The Book of Names by J. N. Hook, the longest place name in the U. S. may be NUNATHLOOGAGAMIUTBINGOI, the name of some dunes in Alaska, taken from Eskimo.
However, in Massachusetts, there is Lake CHARGOGAGOGMANCHARGOGAGOGCHARBUNAGUNGAMOG, usually listed on maps as "Lake Webster." It supposedly means "You fish on your side, I'll fish on my side, nobody fish in the middle."
The shortest placenames in the U. S. may be L (a lake in Nebraska) and T (a gulch in Colorado), each named for its shape, and D (a river in Oregon flowing from Devil's Lake to the Ocean near Lincoln City). According to Howard Lewis, the D River is the shortest river in the world. There are villages called A (with a ring over the A) in Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, a Y in France, and U in the Pacific Caroline Islands.
The only one-letter placename in the index of the Rand McNally International Atlas is A, a peak in Hong Kong (although the Atlas shows political units named with Roman numerals).
