Showing posts with label Rarely Used Words. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rarely Used Words. Show all posts

Thursday, April 5, 2012

Strange and funny English words part III



Agastopia
Admiration of a particular part of a woman's body.

Anencephalous
Characterized by partial or total absence of a brain

Batrachomyomachy
The battle between the frogs and mice; a Greek parody on the Iliad, of uncertain authorship.

Bibble
A pebble.
One of those little stones that gets trapped in your shoe when you are walking.

Borborygm
A rumbling or gurgling noise produced by wind in the bowels.

Catercornered
Diagonal.
In a diagonal position.

Crudivore
An eater of raw food

Depone
To give testimony by affidavit or deposition.
Swear: make a deposition; declare under oath.

Doodle sack
A bagpipe. 

Erinaceous
Of, pertaining to, or resembling a hedgehog.

Fard
To paint the face with cosmetics.
To gloss over.

Finnimbrun
A trifle, trinket or knick-knack.

Gabelle
The gabelle was a very unpopular tax on salt in France before 1790. 

Gaberlunzie
A wandering beggar.

Gardyloo!
Used by servants in medieval Scotland to warn passers-by of waste about to be thrown from a window into the street below.

Gastromancy
A form of divination involving listening to stomach sounds.
A form of divination by gazing into a crystal ball or a glass full of water.

Gobemouche
Literally, a fly swallower; hence, once who keeps his mouth open.
A boor; a silly and credulous person.
A highly gullible person.

Gongoozle
To leisurely watch the passage of boats, from the bank of a canal, lock or bridge.
To observe things idly.

Halfpace
A raised floor or dais or a platform or footpace at the top of steps, as for a throne or an altar.
A landing of a staircase like a broad step between two half flights.

Impignorate
To impignorate or pignorate means to put up as security or to pawn.

Inaniloquent
Given to talking inanely.
Loquacious.
Garrulous.

Jentacular
Of or pertaining to a breakfast taken early in the morning, or immediately on getting up.

Kakorrhaphiophobia
The fear of failure or defeat.

Lagopodous
In zoology, hare-footed
Having the feet densely furry or feathery, as a lemming or a ptarmigan.

Lamprophony
Loudness and clarity of enunciation.

Limerance
An involuntary cognitive and emotional state of being infatuated or obsessed with another person.

Macrosmatic
Having the sense or organs of smell highly developed 

Mesonoxian
Pertaining to the hour of midnight.
Of or related to midnight.

Nihilarian
One who subscribes to nihilism.
Of or pertaining to nihilism.

Nudiustertian
Of or pertaining to the day before yesterday.

Oocephalus
An individual characterized by an egg-shaped head.
A skull shape disorder.

Pandiculation
Yawning and stretching, as when first waking up.

Pauciloquent
Using few words when speaking.
Brief in speech.

Phenakism
Deception.
Trickery.

Pulveratricious
Nesting on the ground.
Covered with dust.

Ranivorous
Pertaining to creatures that eat frogs.
(Ranivore) frog-eating.

Rastaquouere
A social upstart, especially from a Mediterranean or Latin American country.
A smooth untrustworthy foreigner.

Selcouth
Strange, unusual, rare.
Marvellous, wondrous.

Sialoquent
Spitting while speaking.

Slangwhanger
One who verbally attacks others; normally a politician or editor.

Smellfungus
An excessively fault-finding person.
A perpetual pessimist

Snickersnee
Knife fight: fighting with knives.
A knife resembling a sword.

Snollygoster
A shrewd person not guided by principles, especially a politician.

Turdiform
Of, relating to or resembling a thrush, or any other bird of the family Turdidae.

Tyrotoxism
Tyrotoxism is the poisoning of one with cheese or any other milk product. 

Ulotrichous
Having woolly, curly or crispy hair.

Xertz
To gulp down quickly and greedily.

Zabernism
Abusive misuse of military authority.
Bullying.

Zoanthropy
The delusion that you have assumed the form of an animal.

Wednesday, March 7, 2012

Strange and funny English words part II


Godwottery (noun) [mass noun]
An affected quality of archaism, excessive fussiness, and sentimentality.

Gonzo (adjective)
Relating to or denoting journalism of an exaggerated, subjective, and fictionalized style.
Bizarre or crazy: the woman was either gonzo or stoned.

Goombah (noun)
An associate or accomplice, especially a senior member of a criminal gang.

Hemidemisemiquaver (noun)
A note with the time value of half a demisemiquaver, represented by a large dot with a four-hooked stem. Also called sixty-fourth note.

Hobbledehoy (noun)
A clumsy or awkward youth.
(adjective)
Awkward or clumsy: his hobbledehoy hands.

Hoosegow (noun)
A prison.

Hootenanny (noun) (plural hootenannies)
An informal gathering with folk music: we invited friends to a hootenanny in our backyard [as modifier]: hootenanny numbers.

Jackanapes (noun)
Dated a cheeky or impertinent person.
Archaic a tame monkey.

La-di-da (adjective)
Pretentious or snobbish in manner or speech: do I really sound like a la-di-da society lawyer?

Lickspittle (noun)
A person who behaves obsequiously to those in power: he is a lickspittle for the Establishment.

Logorrhea (noun) [mass noun]
A tendency to extreme loquacity.

Lollygag (verb)
(Lollygags, lollygagging, lollygagged)
Spend time aimlessly; idle: she goes to Arizona every January to lollygag in the sun.
[With adverbial of direction] dawdle: we’re lollygagging along.

Mugwump (noun)
A person who remains aloof or independent, especially from party politics.

Mumpsimus (noun)
A traditional custom or idea adhered to although shown to be unreasonable.
A person who obstinately adheres to old customs or ideas in spite of evidence that they are wrong or unreasonable.

Mungo (noun) [mass noun]
Cloth made from recycled woven or felted material.

Oxter (noun)
A person’s armpit.

Panjandrum (noun)
A person who has or claims to have a great deal of authority or influence: the greatest scientific panjandrum of the 19th century [as title]: the Great Panjandrum of this exercise is a management consultant.

Pettifogger (noun)
An inferior legal practitioner, especially one who deals with petty cases or employs dubious practices.

Pronk (verb)
(Of a springbok or other antelope) leap in the air with an arched back and stiff legs, typically as a form of display or when threatened: grysbok were pronking over tall tufts of grass.

Quean (noun)
An impudent or badly behaved girl or woman.
A prostitute.

Quire (noun)
Four sheets of paper or parchment folded to form eight leaves, as in medieval manuscripts.
Any collection of leaves one within another in a manuscript or book: the scribe numbered the quires of his manuscript as well as the leaves.
25 (formerly 24) sheets of paper; one twentieth of a ream: [as partitive]: (a quire of/quires of the package contained two quires of tracing paper.

Ratoon (noun)
A new shoot or sprout springing from the base of a crop plant, especially sugar cane, after cropping.
(verb)
(Of sugar cane) produce ratoons.
[With object] cut down (a plant) to cause it to produce ratoons: (as adjective ratooned) ratooned plants produce a much earlier crop.

Salopettes (plural noun)
Trousers with a high waist and shoulder straps, typically made of a padded fabric and worn for skiing.

Skullduggery (noun) [mass noun]
Underhand, unscrupulous, or dishonest behaviour or activities: a firm that investigates commercial skulduggery.

Tatterdemalion (adjective)
Tattered or dilapidated.
(noun)
A person in tattered clothing.

Troglodyte (noun)
(Especially in prehistoric times) a person who lived in a cave.
A hermit.
A person who is regarded as being deliberately ignorant or old-fashioned.

Valetudinarian (noun)
A person who is unduly anxious about their health.
A person suffering from poor health.
(adjective)
Showing undue concern about one’s health: the valetudinarian English
Suffering from poor health.

Vomitory (adjective)
Relating to or inducing vomiting.
(noun) (plural vomitories)
Another term for vomitorium.

Vomitorium (noun)
Each of a series of entrance or exit passages in an ancient Roman amphitheatre or theatre.
A place in which, according to popular misconception, the ancient Romans are supposed to have vomited during feasts to make room for more food.

Wabbit (adjective)
Exhausted or slightly unwell: I’m feeling a bit wabbit.

Winklepicker (noun)
A shoe with a long pointed toe, popular in the 1950s.

Yarborough (noun)
(In bridge or whist) a hand with no card above a nine.

Tuesday, March 6, 2012

Strange and funny English words part I


Abibliophobia (noun)
The fear of running out of things to read

Absquatulate (verb)
Leave abruptly: some overthrown dictator who had absquatulated to the USA

Argle-bargle (noun) [mass noun]
Copious but meaningless talk or writing; waffle: bureaucratic argle-bargle
Another term for argy-bargy.

Billingsgate (noun)
A London fish market dating from the 16th century. In 1982 the market moved to the Isle of Dogs in the East End.

Bloviate (verb)
Talk at length, especially in an inflated or empty way.

Boustrophedon (adjective & adverb)
(Of written words) from right to left and from left to right in alternate lines.

Cabotage (noun) [mass noun]
The right to operate sea, air, or other transport services within a particular territory.
Restriction of the operation of sea, air, or other transport services within or into a particular country to that country’s own transport services.

Callipygian (adjective)
Having well-shaped buttocks.

Cockalorum (noun) (plural cockalorums)
A self-important man.

Collop (noun)
A slice of meat: three collops of bacon

Collywobbles (plural noun)
Stomach pain or queasiness: an attack of collywobbles
Intense anxiety or nervousness: such organizations give him the collywobbles

Comeuppance (noun)
A punishment or fate that someone deserves: he got his comeuppance in the end

Crapulence (adjective)
Relating to the drinking of alcohol or drunkenness.

Donnybrook  (noun)
A scene of uproar and disorder; a heated argument: raucous ideological donnybrooks

Dudgeon (noun) [mass noun]
A feeling of offence or deep resentment: the manager walked out in high dudgeon

Ecdysiast (noun)
A striptease performer.

Eructation (noun)
A belch: I heard what sounded like a half-stoppered eructation[mass noun]:the only complaint that still tormented her was eructation

Fartlek (noun) [mass noun]
A system of training for distance runners in which the terrain and pace are continually varied.

Firkin (noun)
A small cask formerly used for liquids, butter, or fish.
A unit of liquid volume equal to half a kilderkin (usually 9 imperial gallons or about 41 litres).

Firman (noun) (plural firmans or farmans)
An oriental sovereign’s edict.
A grant or permit.

Flibbertigibbet (noun)
A frivolous, flighty, or excessively talkative person.

Floccinaucinihilipilification (noun) [mass noun]
The action or habit of estimating something as worthless.

Folderol (noun) [mass noun]
Trivial or nonsensical fuss: all the folderol of the athletic contests and the cheerleaders
Dated a showy but useless item.

Formication (noun) [mass noun]
A sensation like insects crawling over the skin.

Furbelow (noun)
A gathered strip or pleated border of a skirt or petticoat.
(furbelows) showy ornaments or trimmings: frills and furbelows just made her look stupid
(verb) [with object] (usually as adjective furbelowed)
Adorn with trimmings: cold chickens and galantines, all white-frilled and furbelowed

Furphy (noun) (plural furphies)
A rumour or story, especially one that is untrue or absurd: I remembered the schoolyard furphies about sewer gangs

Gazump (verb)
Make a higher offer for a house than (someone whose offer has already been accepted by the seller) and thus succeed in acquiring the property: the trio are fuming after they were gazumped by a property speculator (as noun gazumping) gazumping has returned, as there is a shortage of good properties
Dated swindle (someone):I gazumped a friend of mine with complete success last night

Gobbledygook (noun) [mass noun]
Language that is meaningless or is made unintelligible by excessive use of technical terms: reams of financial gobbledegook