Terminology and Words

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  • The word posh, which denotes luxurious rooms or accomodations, originated when ticket agents in England marked the tickets of travelers going by ship to the Orient. Since there was no air conditioning in those days, it was always better to have a cabin on the shady side of the ship as it passed through the Mediterranean and Suez area. Since the sun is in the south, those with money paid extra to get cabin's on the left, or port, traveling to the Asia, and on the right, or starboard, when returning to Europe. Hence their tickets were marked with the initials for Port Outbound Starboard Homebound, or POSH.


  • Parthenogenesis is the term used to describe the process by which certain animals are able to reproduce themselves in successive female generations without intervention of a male of the species. At least one species of lizard is known to do so.


  • The infinity sign is called a lemniscate.


  • There are six five words in the English language with the letter combination "uu." Muumuu, vacuum, continuum, duumvirate and duumvir, residuum.


  • The word "modem" is a contraction of the words "modulate, demodulate."


  • The word "queueing" is the only English word with five consecutive vowels.


  • An animal epidemic is called an epizootic.


  • The name Jeep came from the abbreviation used in the army for the "General Purpose" vehicle, G.P.


  • The two longest one-syllable words in the English language are "screeched" and "strengths."


  • No word in the English language rhymes with month.


  • The naval rank of "Admiral" is derived from the Arabic phrase "amir al bahr", which means "lord of the sea".


  • No modern language has a true concept of "I am." It is always used linked with are in reference of another verb.


  • The letter W is the only letter in the alphabet that doesn't have 1 syllable... it has three.


  • The dot over the letter 'i' is called a tittle.


  • The word "hangnail" comes from Middle English: ang- (painful) + nail. Nothing to do with hanging.


  • The expression "What in tarnation" comes from the original meaning: "What in eternal damnation"


  • The ampersand (&) is actually a stylised version of the Latin word "et," meaning and."


  • The word "set" has more definitions than any other word in the English language.


  • Race car is a palindrome.


  • When measuring fonts 'point size' refers to the height of capital letters (one point being one 72nd of an inch). 'Pitch' is a horizontal measurement of the number of letters which can be printed in an inch.


  • "Speak of the Devil" is short for "Speak of the Devil and he shall come". It was believed that if you spoke about the Devil it would attract his attention. That's why when your talking about someone and they show up people say "Speak of the Devil"


  • There are only four words in the English language which end in "-dous": tremendous, horrendous, stupendous, and hazardous.


  • The longest time someone has typed on a typewriter continuously is 264 hrs., set by Violet Gibson Burns.


  • There is a word in the English language with only one vowel, which occurs six times: Indivisibility.


  • Facetious and abstemious contain all the vowels in the correct order.


  • The second longest word in the English language is "antidisestablishmenterianism".


  • When two words are combined to form a single word (e.g., motor + hotel = motel, breakfast + lunch = brunch) the new word is called a "portmanteau."


  • 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, here, ere, therein, herein.


  • You would have to count to one thousand to use the letter "A" in the English language to spell a whole number.


  • The letters H I O X in the latin alphabet is the only ones that look the same if you turn them upside down or see them from behind.


  • No words in the English language rhyme with orange, silver or purple.


  • "Bookkeeper" and "bookkeeping" are the only words in the English language with three consecutive double letters.


  • The phrase "sleep tight" originated when mattresses were set upon ropes woven through the bed frame. To remedy sagging ropes, one would use a bed key to tighten the rope.


  • The words 'sacrilegious' and 'religion' do not share the same etymological root.


  • "Freelance" comes from a knight whose lance was free for hire, i.e. not pledged to one master.)


  • S.O.S. doesn't stand for "Save Our Ship" or "Save Our Souls" -- It was just chosen by an 1908 international conference on Morse Code because the letters S and O were easy to remember and just about anyone could key it and read it, S = dot dot dot, O = dash dash dash..


  • The Sanskrit word for "war" means "desire for more cows."


  • A 'jiffy' is an actual unit of time for 1/100th of a second.


  • The phrase "rule of thumb" is derived from an old English law which stated that you couldn't beat your wife with anything wider than your thumb.


  • The youngest letters in the English language are "j," "v" and "w."


  • 'Strengths' is the longest word in the English language with just one vowel.


  • 'Stewardesses' is the longest word that is typed with only the left hand.


  • One of the longest English words that can be typed using the top row of a typewriter (allowing multiple uses of letters) is 'typewriter.'


  • AM and PM stand for "Ante-Meridian" and "Post-Meridian," respectively, and A.D. actually stands for "Anno Domini" rather than "After Death."


  • Jet lag was once called boat lag, back before jets existed.


  • The raised reflective dots in the middle of highways are called Botts dots.


  • The derivation of the word trivia comes from the Latin "tri-" + "via", which means three streets. This is because in ancient times, at an intersection of three streeets in Rome (or some other Italian place), they would have a type of kiosk where ancillary information was listed. You might be interested in it, you might not, hence they were bits of "trivia."


  • The longest one-syllable word in the English language is "screeched."


  • No word in the English language rhymes with month, orange, silver or purple


  • "Dreamt" is the only English word that ends in the letters "mt".


  • The sentence "the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" uses every letter in the English language.


  • "I am." is the shortest complete sentence in the English language.


  • The ball on top of a flagpole is called the truck.