Interesting Mail Forwards

The longest English word and other curious words

The longest English word: The question of determining the longest
English word inevitably boils down to defining what is acceptable as a
word, since prefixes/suffixes can be adjoined to words to make longer
words and because medical/chemical terms can get arbitrarily long.

Further, most contenders for the honor of being the longest word are
likely to be very rare in actual usage - so rare, in fact that they
could be considered nonce words. The most common candidates for the
crown, in my opinion, are

antidisestablishmentarianism (28 letters),
floccinaucinihilipilification (29 letters) and
pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanokoniosis (45 letters).

The first is the only one of the three that was not specifically
constructed for the purpose of being a very long word. It means
opposition to the separation of church and state. The second, meaning
the estimation of something as worthless, is the longest non-technical
word in the OED. The latter, supposedly a lung disease, appears to be
a semi-serious concoction.

Lexically interesting words. .
 Longest word without a vowel: symphysy.
Runners-up: nymphly,
rhythms, gypsyfy, gypsyry. Excluding 'y': crwths.
 Longest word with at most 1 vowel: glycyphyllin, psychorhythm.
 Word with most vowels: counterrevolutionaries (among others).
 Word with most consecutive vowels (5): cooeeing, miaoued, miaouing,
queueing. (Euouae, consisting of nothing but 6 vowels, is of doubtful
legitimacy.)
 Smallest word with all 5 vowels: eulogia, miaoued, sequoia.
 Longest word with only 3 distinct alphabets: seeresses.
 Longest word with only 4 distinct alphabets: senselessness.
 Longest word with no repeated letter: dermatoglyphics.
 Longest word with letters in alphabetical order: aegilops.
 Longest word with letters in reverse alphabetical order: trollied.
 Longest word that can be typed with the right hand alone (on a
qwerty keyboard): phyllophyllin.
 Longest word that can be typed with the left hand alone (on a
qwerty keyboard): devertebrated.
 Longest word that can be typed using the top row (of a qwerty
keyboard): rupturewort. Runners-up: peppertree, pepperwort,
perpetuity, proprietor, repertoire, tetterwort, typewriter.
 Interesting words with the substring 'uu': continuum, fatuus,
menstruum, residiuum, vacuum.
 Word with the maximum number of distinct alphabets (16):
blepharoconjunctivitis, formaldehydesulphoxylic,
pneumoventriculography, pseudolamellibranchiate, superacknowledgment.
 Word with most a's (6): astragalocalcaneal, calcaneoastragalar,
taramasalata.
 Word with most e's (7): electrotelethermometer.
 Word with most i's (6): impossibilification, indistinguishability,
indivisibility, minimifidianism, pericardiomediastinitis.
 Word with most o's (6): choledochoduodenostomy,
duodenocholedochotomy, monogonoporous, odontonosology,
proctocolonoscopy, pseudomonocotyledonous, zoologicoarchaeologist.
 Word with most u's (5): untumultous.
 Words with four consecutive letters of the alphabet appearing
consecutively:
    mnop: cremnophobia, gymnopaedic, gymnoplast, limnophile,
somnopathy (and a few others).
    rstu: overstudy, overstuff, understudy, afterstudy,
overstudious, superstuff, understuff (and a few others).

    Words with four consecutive letters of the alphabet appearing
consecutively in reverse order:
       ponm: tamponment, weaponmaker.

       Words with 3 consecutive s's: bossship, headmistressship,
patronessship.
       The last word: zyzzyva.

YOU MAY KNOW THESE WORDS !
TYPEWRITER (10 letters) can be typed using only the top row of keys on
a standard keyboard.

FICKLEHEADED and FIDDLEDEEDEE are the longest English words consisting
only of letters in the first half of the alphabet, each being 12
letters long.

PARADIGM was the word most frequently looked up in 1998 in the
Merriam-Webster online dictionary.

The words most likely to be misspelled (ratio of incorrect to correct
spelling) according to a study of Usenet traffic some years ago were
DUMBELL, OCCURRENCE, MEMENTO, FRUSTUM, COLLECTIBLE, AMATEUR, DAIQUIRI,
PASTIME, ACCIDENTALLY, PLAYWRIGHT, EMBARRASS, ACQUIT, HARASS, and
PRONUNCIATION.

HIRSCHSPRUNG'S (DISEASE) has seven consecutive consonants, as does
SCHTSCHUROWSKIA.

Beijing and Fiji have three dotted letters in a row.

The alphabetical sequence -RSTU- is contained in OVERSTUFF,
OVERSTUDIOUS, OVERSTUNK, UNDERSTUFF, UNDERSTUMBLE, SUPERSTUD,
OVERSTUMBLE, SUPERSTUFF, UNDERSTUDY, and BIERSTUBE.
The only other four-letter alphabetical sequence found in English is
-MNOP-, which is found, for example, in these words: CREMNOPHOBIA,
GYMNOPAEDIC, GYMNOPHOBIA, GYMNOPLAST, LIMNOPHILE, LIMNOPHORA,
LIMNOPHORID, LIMNOPLANKTON, SEMNOPITHECINE, SOMNOPATHY, and
THAMNOPHILE.
If the alphabet is treated as a continuous loop, however, there is
also -YZAB- in ANALYZABLE.
Here are some examples words containing double letters, for each
letter of the alphabet: AARDVARK, ABBOT, ACCENT, ADD, FEED, OFF, EGG,
WITHHOLD, SKIING, AVIJJA, BOOKKEEPER, ILL, IMMUNE, ANNOY, HOOP, APPLE,
HUQQA, ARRAY, KISS, LITTLE, VACUUM, SAVVY, SLOWWORM, WAXXENN,
CUBBYYEW, and DAZZLE.
HONORIFICABILITUDINITATIBUS is the longest word consisting entirely of
alternating vowels and consonants.
The longest common word without any of the five vowels is RHYTHMS.
The shortest word containing all five vowels exactly once is the
six-letter EUNOIA, meaning alertness of mind an will (and also the
title of a book by Canadian poet Christian Bok).
The shortest word with the five vowels occurring in alphabetical order
is AERIOUS (airy), which has seven letters. The longest such word is
PHRAGELLIORHYNCHUS (a protozoan) with 18 letters.
ULTRAREVOLUTIONARIES has each vowel exactly twice. The shortest such
word is CUBOIDEONAVICULARE, and the longest, USSOLZEWIECHINOGAMMARUS
(a small crustacean).
Some English words..................

Floccinaucinihilipilification
It means "the estimation of something as worthless."
Examples:
I loved him for nothing so much as his floccinaucinihilipilification of
money.
--William Shenstone, Letters

Some more english words:
They must be taken with an air of contempt, a
floccinaucinihilipilification of all that can gratify the outward man.
--Sir Walter Scott, Journal

Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis which has 45 letters.
It's a disease that miners in Africa came down with from getting
silicon slivers in their lungs.

Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch, a village
in Wales. This name is given in full on the railway station. The local
people do not bother to say the name in full. They refer to it as
Lannfair PG.
However, there is a place with an even longer name in New Zealand. It
is the name of a hill. Here it is: This is not in English though but
in Maori
Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateaturipukakapikimaungahoronukupokaiw
en uaitnatahu.
But if you just want long words, the usual response is
antidisestablishmentarianism, and this can be found in most
dictionaries.

The longest word in the dictionary containing no letter more than once
is "smiley." (There is a mile between the first and last letter.)

Chemical name for the "Tryptophan Synthetase" protein  is however, the
longest official word ever (1,913 letters) with the formula
C1289H2051N343O375S8

And it is spelled:


methionylglutaminylarginyltyrosylglutamylserylleucylphenylalany
lalanylglutaminylleucyllysylglutamylarginyllysylglutamylglycylalany
lphenylalanylvalylprolylphenylalanylvalylthreonylleucylglycylaspa
rtylprolylglycylisoleucylglutamylglutaminylserylleucyllysylisoleu
cylaspartylthreonylleucylisoleucylglutamylalanylglycylalanylaspar
tylalanylleucylglutamylleucylglycylisoleucylprolylphenylalanylser
ylaspartylprolylleucylalanylaspartylglycylprolylthreonyliso
leucylglutaminylaspfraginylalanylthreonylleucylarginylalanylpheny
lalanylalanylalanylglycylvalylthreonylprolylalanylglutaminylcyste
inylphenylalanylglutamylmethionylleucylalanylleucylisoleucylargin
ylglutaminyllysylhistidylprolylthreonylisoleucylprolylisoleucylgl
ycylleucylleucylmethionyltyrosylalanylasparaginylleucylvalylpheny
lalanylasparaginyllysylglycylisoleucylaspartylglutamylphenylalany
ltyrosylalanylglutaminylcysteinylglutamyllysylvalylglycylva
lylaspartylserylvalylleucylvalylalanylaspartylvalylprolylvalylglu
taminylglutamylserylalanylprolylphenylalanylarginylglutaminylalan
ylalanylleucylarginylhistidylasparaginylvalylalanylprolylisoleucy
lphenylalanylisoleucylcysteinylprolylprolylaspartylalanylaspartyl
aspartylaspartylleucylleucylarginylglutaminylisoleucylalanylseryl
tyrosylglycylarginylglycyltyrosylthreonyltyrosylleucylleucylseryl
arginylalanylglycylvalylthreonylglycylalanylglutamylasparag
inylarginylalanylalanylleucylprolylleucylasparaginylhistidylleucy
lvalylalanyllysylleucyllysylglutamyltyrosylasparaginylalanylalany
lprolylprolylleucylglutaminylglycylphenylalanylglycylisoleucylser
ylalanylprolylaspartylglutaminylvalyllysylalanylalanylisoleucylas
partylalanylglycylalanylalanylglycylalanylisoleucylserylglycylser
ylalanylisoleucylvalyllysylisoleucylisoleucylglutamylglutaminylhi
stidylasparaginylisoleucylglutamylprolylglutamyllysylmethio
nylleucylalanylalanylleucyllysylvalylphenylalanylvalylglutaminylp
rolylmethionyllysylalanylalanylthreonylarginylserine.
Thats all for now

posted by Amba K  # 3:57 AM