Saw this lot and thought of you.
*Other than "subcontinental" there are two words which
contain all of the vowels in reverse order:
Unnoticeably, and Uncomplimentary
Mark B.wrote : When you say that there are only 2 other words besides subcontinental that have the vowels in reverse alphabetical order, I think you are in error. The other two listed: unnoticeably and uncomplimentary have the letter "y" which in these cases are vowels, which would eliminate these two and leave just subcontinental. You repeat this lower on the site correctly by saying subcontinental is the only word that has its vowels in reverse order.}
*The only three four words in the English language to beging with DW are
Dwarf, Dwell, Dweeb and Dwindle
*The only word to be comprised of two letters, each repeated three times, is: Deeded*The only word which can be turned from a plural into a singular by the REMOVAL of the letter's' from the end, is: Caress
*Contributed by Riki Wi from NZ"Floccinaucinihilipilification". Since 1741, that twenty-nine letter word has been used to refer to "the categorizing of something as worthless or trivial. "Floccinaucinihilipilification has nine "I's," more than any other word. is the longest word in English to lack the letter "E."
"Feedback" is the shortest word in English that contains the letters A, B, C, D, E and F.
"Rhythms" and "syzygy" are the longest English words without vowels.
*Mark B. says: "rhythms" and "syzygy", I believe, contain the vowel "Y" in these cases; thus, these are words that do have a vowel.
No word in the English language rhymes with month, orange, silver, and purple. The only 15 letter word that can be spelled without repeating a letter is 'uncopyrightable' The word "queue" is the only word in the English language that is still pronounced the same way when the last four letters are removed. The word "dreamt" is the only word in the English language that ends in the letters 'mt'. The longest one-syllable word in the English language is "screeched."
*Mark B:The longest 1-syllable word in not just "screeched". There is "scratched" and "strengths" to name a few others.
"Muscle" stems from the word "mouse." People believed watching muscles move looked like a mouse crawling under the skin. "Q" is the only letter that does not appear in any of the names of the 50 United States. There is no synonym for "thesaurus." "Whence" means "from where," so "from whence" is redundant.
The only word with three double letters back to back is "bookkeeper" The verb "cleave" is the only English word with two synonyms which are antonyms of each other: adhere and separate.The word "set" has the highest number of separate definitions in the English Language (192 definitions according to the Oxford English Dictionary.)
In the 19th century, craftsmen who made hats were known to be excitable and irrational, as well as to tremble with palsy and mix up their words. Such behavior gave rise to the familiar expression "mad as a hatter". The disorder, called hatter's shakes, was caused by chronic mercury poisoning from the solution used to treat the felt. Attacking the central nervous system, the toxin led to behavioral symptoms.
In 1945 a computer at Harvard malfunctioned and Grace Hopper, who was working on the computer, investigated, found a moth in one of the circuits and removed it. Ever since, when something goes wrong with a computer, it is said to have a bug in it.
Clans of long ago that wanted to get rid of their unwanted people without killing them used to burn their houses down - hence the expression "to get fired."
A "Blue Moon" is the second full moon in a calendar month (it is rarely blue).
"Second string," meaning "replacement or backup," comes from the middle ages. An archer always carried a second string in case the one on his bow broke.
"Ough" can be pronounced in eight different ways. The following sentence contains them all: "A rough-coated, dough-faced ploughman strode through the streets of Scarborough, coughing and hiccoughing thoughtfully.
The last thing to happen is the ultimate. The next-to-last is the penultimate, and the second-to-last is the antepenultimate.
The plastic things on the end of shoelaces are called aglets.
The term "dog days" has nothing to do with dogs. It dates back to Roman times, when it was believed that Sirius, the Dog Star, added its heat to that of the sun from July 3 to August 11, creating exceptionally high temperatures. The Romans called the period dies caniculares, or "days of the dog."
Theodore Roosevelt was the only U.S. president to deliver an inaugural address without using the word "I". Abraham Lincoln, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Dwight D. Eisenhower tied for second place, using "I" only once in their inaugural addresses.Maine is the only state whose name is just one syllable.
There are only four words in the English language which end in "-dous": tremendous, horrendous, stupendous, and hazardous. Typewriter and Proprietor are the only ten letter words you can type on the top row of your keyboard. *(thanks for proprietor Michele)
"I am" is the shortest complete sentence in the English language. The longest non-medical word in the English language is floccipausinihilipilification (29 letters), which means "the act of estimating as worthless."
*Mark B wrote: The longest non-medical word in the English Language is not "floccipausinihilipilification" (29 letters) but rather
"pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis" (45 letters) meaning "a
pneumoconiosis caused by inhalation of very fine silicate or quartz dust "
The pound sign # is called a 'octothorp.
The word 'byte' is a contraction of 'by eight.
'The word "trivia" comes from the Latin "trivium" which is the place where three roads meet, a public square. People would gather and talk about all sorts of matters, most of which were trivial.
All pilots on international flights identify themselves in English.
There is a seven-letter word in the English language that contains ten words without rearranging any of its letters, "therein": the, there, he, in, rein, her, here, ere, therein, herein. "Irrupt" is a misspelling of "erupt," right? Wrong! The two have existed as discrete words since at least the mid-1500s. Both are descendants of the Latin verb "rumpere," which means "to break," but "irrupt" was formed by adding the prefix "ir-" (in the sense "into") while "erupt" was formed by adding "e-" (meaning "out"). So "to irrupt" was originally to rush in, and "to erupt" was to rush out. But it's sometimes hard to distinguish the precise direction of a violent rush, and the two soon came to be used as synonyms, a usage that has continued for at least the last 400 years.
In the English language there are only three words that have a letter that repeats six times. Degenerescence (six e's), Indivisibility (six i's), and nonannouncement (six n's).
The only three words in the English language to have 2 consecutive u's is vacuum, residuum, and continuum.
The only word in the English language that has 4 sets of double letters in a row is balloonneer.
The only word with all the vowels in reverse order is subcontinental. The sentence "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog." uses every letter of the alphabet!
The sentence "Pack my box with five dozen liquor jugs" uses every letter of the alphabet and uses the least letters to do so! Did you know?
Reply With Quote
Originally Posted by FlangMaster
Bookmarks