×
INTELLIGENT WORK FORUMS
FOR ENGINEERING PROFESSIONALS

Log In

Come Join Us!

Are you an
Engineering professional?
Join Eng-Tips Forums!
  • Talk With Other Members
  • Be Notified Of Responses
    To Your Posts
  • Keyword Search
  • One-Click Access To Your
    Favorite Forums
  • Automated Signatures
    On Your Posts
  • Best Of All, It's Free!
  • Students Click Here

*Eng-Tips's functionality depends on members receiving e-mail. By joining you are opting in to receive e-mail.

Posting Guidelines

Promoting, selling, recruiting, coursework and thesis posting is forbidden.

Students Click Here

Jobs

one-syllable words

one-syllable words

one-syllable words

(OP)

Is it true that "strengthed" is the longest one-syllable word in English ?

RE: one-syllable words

I would offer my immediate response (Aaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!) to hearing "Strengthed" introduced into the english language in place of the perfectly adequate "Strengthened" as a worthy contender.

A.

RE: one-syllable words

(OP)

Whether the word strenghted -which I've seen quite frequently used- is a barbarism or not I couldn't 'tell, but is strenghtened a monosyllable ?

RE: one-syllable words

No, but I think "Aaaaaaaaaaaaaargh" is.

A.

RE: one-syllable words

Re the wkiperdia article.

How can "squirreled" and "quarreled" possibly be considered as single syllable words? Admittedly the article does say that it is "arguable" if squirreled is one syllable. I would sure like to see that argument.

I suppose in some dialects it might come out as one ("squirled", "quarled") - a bit like the British surname and place name "Featherstonehaugh" which is actually pronounced "Fanshaw".

M

--
Dr Michael F Platten

RE: one-syllable words

...and "I do." is the longest sentence in the English language.

RE: one-syllable words

I always thought "smiles" is the longest single-syllable word in the English language - it has a mile between the first and last letters!

(Sorry! blushing)

RE: one-syllable words

I thought about this as I was being broughammed to the airport this morning, but I couldn't think of a bigger word.  Sorry.

Don
Kansas City

RE: one-syllable words

Don't locals slang their town names into one...or close to one...syllable?

New Orleans:  Nawlns

Louisville:  Louvl

RE: one-syllable words

The one most commonly cited is screeched (nine letters). However, one ought to mention also scratched, scrounged, scrunched, stretched, and the plural nouns straights and strengths (all with nine letters).

The complete Oxford English Dictionary also indicates the existence of scraughed, scrinched, scritched, scrooched, sprainged, spreathed, throughed, and thrutched.

The OED also cites a single instance of the ten-letter word scraunched, from the 1620 English translation of Don Quixote.

woodengineer

RE: one-syllable words

JAE--those are still 2-syllable.  L, R, M, N can all be syllabic.  

(Yeah, I know you're kidding, but I'm a sucker for linguistbait.)

Hg

p.s. "strengthed"???

Eng-Tips policies:  FAQ731-376

RE: one-syllable words

I can't find "strengthed" in any dictionary - does is still count as an English word?

(I resisted the temptation to add that I've never heard it used either - my own ignorance shouldn't be a disqualifier, although its generally not a bad indicator!)

RE: one-syllable words

Strengthed is an archaic word taken from old English:

"strengthed", be made strong; be fortified; have strength (to do sth.); ben
strengthed to pasture, of an animal: become mature enough to graze.

woodengineer

Red Flag This Post

Please let us know here why this post is inappropriate. Reasons such as off-topic, duplicates, flames, illegal, vulgar, or students posting their homework.

Red Flag Submitted

Thank you for helping keep Eng-Tips Forums free from inappropriate posts.
The Eng-Tips staff will check this out and take appropriate action.

Reply To This Thread

Posting in the Eng-Tips forums is a member-only feature.

Click Here to join Eng-Tips and talk with other members!


Resources