- Ailurophile - A cat-lover
- Assemblage - A gathering
- Becoming - Attractive
- Beleaguer - To exhaust with attacks
- Brood - To think alone
- Bucolic - In a lovely rural setting
- Bungalow - A small, cozy cottage
- Chatoyant - Like a cat's eye
- Comely - Attractive
- Conflate - To blend together
- Cynosure - A focal point of admiration
- Dalliance - A brief love affair
- Demesne - Dominion, territory
- Demure - Shy and reserved
- Denouement - The resolution of a mystery
- Desuetude - Disuse
- Desultory - Slow, sluggish
- Diaphanous - Filmy
- Dissemble - Deceive
- Dulcet - Sweet, sugary
- Ebullience - Bubbling enthusiasm
- Effervescent - Bubbly
- Efflorescence - Flowering, blooming
- Elision - Dropping a sound or syllable in a word
- Elixir - A good potion
- Eloquence - Beauty and persuasion in speech
- Embrocation - Rubbing on a lotion
- Emollient - A softener
- Ephemeral - Short-lived
- Epiphany - A sudden revelation
- Erstwhile - At one time, for a time
- Ethereal - Gaseous, invisible but detectable
- Evanescent - Vanishing quickly, lasting a very short time
- Evocative - Suggestive
- Fetching - Pretty
- Felicity - Pleasantness
- Forbearance - Withholding response to provocation
- Fugacious - Fleeting
- Furtive - Shifty, sneaky
- Gambol - To skip or leap about joyfully
- Glamour - Beauty
- Gossamer - The finest piece of thread, a spider's silk
- Halcyon - Happy, sunny, care-free
- Harbinger - Messenger with news of the future
- Imbrication - Overlapping and forming a regular pattern
- Imbroglio - An altercation or complicated situation
- Imbue - To infuse, instill
- Incipient - Beginning, in an early stage
- Ineffable - Unutterable, inexpressible
- Ingénue - A naïve young woman
- Inglenook - A cozy nook by the hearth
- Insouciance - Blithe nonchalance
- Inure - To become jaded
- Labyrinthine - Twisting and turning
- Lagniappe - A special kind of gift
- Lagoon - A small gulf or inlet
- Languor - Listlessness, inactivity
- Lassitude - Weariness, listlessness
- Leisure - Free time
- Lilt - To move musically or lively
- Lissome - Slender and graceful
- Lithe - Slender and flexible
- Love - Deep affection
- Mellifluous - Sweet sounding
- Moiety - One of two equal parts
- Mondegreen - A slip of the ear
- Murmurous - Murmuring
- Nemesis - An unconquerable archenemy
- Offing - The sea between the horizon and the offshore
- Onomatopoeia - A word that sounds like its meaning
- Opulent - Lush, luxuriant
- Palimpsest - A manuscript written over earlier ones
- Panacea - A solution for all problem
- Panoply - A complete set
- Pastiche - An art work combining materials from various sources
- Penumbra - A half-shadow
- Petrichor - The smell of earth after rain
- Plethora - A large quantity
- Propinquity - An inclination
- Pyrrhic - Successful with heavy losses
- Quintessential - Most essential
- Ratatouille - A spicy French stew
- Ravel - To knit or unknit
- Redolent - Fragrant
- Riparian - By the bank of a stream
- Ripple - A very small wave
- Scintilla - A spark or very small thing
- Sempiternal - Eternal
- Seraglio - Rich, luxurious oriental palace or harem
- Serendipity - Finding something nice while looking for something else
- Summery - Light, delicate or warm and sunny
- Sumptuous - Lush, luxurious
- Surreptitious - Secretive, sneaky
- Susquehanna - A river in Pennsylvania
- Susurrous - Whispering, hissing
- Talisman - A good luck charm
- Tintinnabulation - Tinkling
- Umbrella - Protection from sun or rain
- Untoward - Unseemly, inappropriate
- Vestigial - In trace amounts
- Wafture - Waving
- Wherewithal - The means
- Woebegone - Sorrowful, downcast
Friday, October 9, 2009
100 Most Beautiful Words in the English Language
Are these them? I prefer the funniest words, myself. But that's just me. Anna? I'm sure you have something to add. Words like these we used to call SAT words.
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6 comments:
I found his assertions that certain sounds were beautiful to be spurious. B as a beautiful sound? Is that because the word beautiful has a B? I find words to be beautiful because their meanings are...so beleaguer (besides being a bitch to spell) isn't one of my top beautiful words. Umbrella? Love (isn't that just a little trite)? I have so many nits to pick...but then you suspected as much.
I remember reading some other, similar list, but one of the "most beautiful" words on the list was gonorrhea, somehow!
I'm proud to say that I knew most of those words. I've been an obsessive vocabulary builder over most of the course of my life. One of my friends even calls me "Mrs. Word" & my manager at the library constantly picks my brain for good, new words.
Lagniappe is a very Louisiana-based word. These days, in this area, it means something more akin to "a little extra," a bonus, of sorts.
BTW, thanks for the anniversary wishes. :)
I like that many of them are also French.
I have to use 'gambol' and must say you have wuite a lagniappe way to find things to post about - love it!
(don't even know if I used it the right way, oh well...)
I have to admit that "Tintinnabulation" is one of my favorite words to say. Some of the rest on the list - I couldn't even begin to pronounce.
Anna - I expected nothing less . . .
Lana - there's nothing wrong with a verbose vocabulary - and you're welcome
Paw - The language of love, of course French would have a number of beautiful words
C - A fine choice
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