Last week, Webb’s Weird Words wandered into the wonky world of sesquipedalian terms — meaning “long” or “polysyllabic” (literally: “one and a half feet”). Today by contrast, we’ll look at the other end of the spectrum — with a selection of diminutive, Lilliputian or teeny-weeny words. (Sorry, there aren’t too many comical synonyms for “short.”)
While perusing my Brobdingnagian list of oddball vocabulary for this week’s selection, I noted that very early on, I’d included “sesquipedalian.” The wonderful American Heritage Dictionary defines this as “long and ponderous,” “polysyllabic” or “given to using long words.” Perfect, I thought; let’s focus this list on words of unusual length. So in keeping with
Last week in this space, we launched a new weekly feature for Webb — the aptly named “World of Weird Words,” selected from hundreds of oddball terms on a list I’ve been amassing since 2005. With my lengthy intro to the series, I had room for only seven entries in that first piece; herewith, I
Snollygoster. Numpty. Absquatulate. Gonk. Yes, those all are actual words. They’re taken from a list I started years ago, when I was teaching English at Loyalsock High School. Inspired by three students who compiled an oddball vocab list for fun, I instantly began amassing my own; eventually, I turned it into one of our weekly
