100 Most beautiful words
 

Here they are.

Duncan

Curious. Curious, indeed.

Long ago I read in a book that the most beautiful sounding expression in the English language is cellar door. And neither word appears on that list.

Tell me where is beauty bred,
Or in the ear or in the head?

Richard

Just considered as a sound, "verminous" is a beautiful word.

Some of my favorite words are incunabula, amphigory, parallax, Tryphiodorus, arbitrary, and Ferdinand de Saussure.

Richard Lederer, in his hilarious book Anguished English, takes apart the notion that words are "beautiful" because of sound alone. He tells the story of a foreign couple who were enthusiastic about learning English and wanted to name their daughter with the most beautiful English word they could find. They named her "Diarrhea."

Duncan, is there any information about the basis for the collection of these words? Perhaps I missed that.

There should be more 'v' words on this list.

Only three monosyllabic words, and no verbs! Why no verbs, I wonder?

Oh yes there is - 'conflate'! Missed it... oh - and "gambol"! I must have been verb-blind in my first read through!

Happily surprised to see Susquehanna on there. I've driven from D.C. to Buffalo several times to visit in-laws, and each time I've followed the Susquehanna northward, I've marveled at both the name and the river itself. Indeed, the name is quite apt: the Susquehanna is very shallow and marshy, with a lot of brush and disembodied tree branches climbing out of it at the most unusual junctures. It looks like you'd imagine "Susquehanna" to look.

Most of the others are indeed quite "poetic" words. And I can't really dispute the beauty of any of them (except maybe "susurrous"), as subjective as such a thing surely is.

One of my favorite words lately has been "rubric." There's something satisfyingly logical about that word, isn't there? And I agree with Ed Shacklee about "v" words. Vermilion is one of my personal faves.

You may be interested to know that 'berserk, fart, testicles' have been voted the three ugliest words in the language. 'Penis' and 'lesbian' were also much disliked. I'm surprised by 'lesbian'. It sounds a lovely word to me. Come on then. The UGLIEST words?

Aardvark? Wigan?

The list is far too latinate for my taste, beautiful words --

thrum
river
camber
auburn
simper
estuary
willow
thalo
ulna
hallow
thurible
dulcimer
dyad
incense

alas,

J

Me too. Too latinate. Some of my faves:

iron

doldrum

flannel

penguin

gull

whiskey

paddock

(must proceed to write poem containing all these words...)

You are all much too objective and fair-minded. Why not post some of your favorite words and phrases that were used in poems that you submitted? Let's see some good old showboating here! Whoa! Wait! Did any of you secretly sneak some of your pets in? Fess up.

I've always loved Danish words that end in -lum or -kum:

Aulum

Bailum

both are place names.

Perikum

a plant.

There is a roundness to the -um.

"Susquehanna and the One and a Half Elders" is, of course,
my favorite story from the Bible.

Only river Skip, sorry.

God bless Cyrus Lauron Hooper, who Tolkien plagiarized 40 years later. Interestingly, the book in question is now available for free from Google Books.

Here's the citation itself: http://books.google.com/books?id=cp4...20door&f=false

If you scroll up a little, you'll find he gives his own list of 'most beautiful words' on the preceding page... ;)

Thanks,

Bill

"gambol" but not "gamble"
"summery" but not "summary"
"brood" but not "brewed"

I like "sumpture", but I've only ever seen it one place, that I can remember: "in the pomp and sumpture of her hey-day".

I'm no wiser than anyone else. I just followed the link I found.

Duncan

Ed: "There should be more 'v' words on this list."

Agreed! I offer one of my favorites, "velleity."

And my favorite didactylic word: "minimifidian."

Jan

The name of the Finnish composer, Einojuhani Rautavaara.

Adam, that's the way I feel about almost all Finnish names. Kalevala. Eero Saarinen...

Will Rogers said, "I never met a man I didn't like." Well, most of us could probably disagree with that observation. But I've never met a word I didn't like, even though as a writer I may like some more than others.

Richard

I’m partial to telluric, involute, cynic, lithe, dulcimer, ziggurat, anodyne, cinnabar, whither, chthonic, and Nineveh.

I see the list has dulcet and cynosure, which at least share roots with a couple of mine. Oh, and lithe is there.

As for the ugliest words: well, there’s always absquatulate. I’ve never actually seen it used, and no wonder.

Toblerone

Aqua Velva

Molotov cocktail

dunebuggy

vajazzle

Hamburger.

Here you are, Rick, but it's not kosher.

Ratatouille made it, but not the lissome, flowing cassoulet? Mais non! I smell a vegetarian rat.

By the way - who determined this list? Was there a committee? And, if so, why for shit's sakes didn't I get a goddammed crack at it?

Abby Cadabby loves all words equally, unlike the pompous elitists who compiled the list.

http://youtu.be/cjRQ6VyG1Yw

All this reminds of the French fellow from Louisiana on his first visit to Paris, whom, after having seen the Louvre and gone up the Eiffel Tower, asked a tour guide what he would recommend besides these two. "Did you ever try a cabriolet?" The La. guy stared at him in disgust and said, "A cochon de lait, yes, but a cabri au lait, never...and that's how it's gonna stay", as he walked away mumbling, "Goat cooked in milk, humph!"

Proper names can also be beautiful words. Porfirio Rubirosa, one of the best names. Celtic words: Aran, chalice, burn, curragh. Eeeee sounds are lovely, too: Eve, weave, sheave. And all Italian words that describe food: pappardelle, prosciutto, tramezzino, barolo, luciferi...

That list is not my list. "Bungalow"?

The whole thing is skewed by adding the definitions alongside. It alters how one sees/says.

I play a classroom game where we choose whether to take a magical word "selador" and run with it, or "write a poem about a cellar door". I've had some interesting results.

One of the poems my father encouraged me to read when I was quite small was "Romance" by W J Turner. I urge you to find it and read it aloud - none of this subvocalising malarkey, mind.

Mmmm - malarkey...

Porfirio Rubirosa. Porfirio is a modern form of the Byzantine and earlier name Porphyry, meaning purple, royalish.

There's a story still circulating about the larger 14-20 inch-long pepper mills found in some restaurants that were, and are still perhaps, called "Rubirosas". Since this is a family-orientated page, I cannot explain why this term came into use, but you can puzzle it out for yourself like an Anglo-Saxon riddle, or --- if you must --- send me a private message and I will reply with the humungous alleged truth. (But you must certify in some satisfactory way, such as swearing on a copy of The Analects in front of four adult witnesses, that you are of legal age in your political jurisdiction. Otherwise, I cannot impart the awesome rumored fact.)


PS: Oh well, the secret, such as it was (how could we know for sure) seems to be available to aficionados:

Thanks, Allen! We've definitely digressed. All of his appeal, of course, was in his name, royal purple red ruby. :)

Pretty hard to judge a word on sound alone, independently of its meaning. Thus death sounds scary, and maybe ugly by association, but selador might sound as sinister if it meant what death means.

I heard there was once a "most beautiful word in English" contest, and the winner was announced as swallow. Picture the trim curves, the graceful swooping, etc. Then someone asked, “Bird or gulp?”

Porfirio Rubirosa, could conceivably bring up associations such as perfidious and rubella: Perfidious Rubella, if you will.

Besides "cellar door", selador (but for -d-) sounds like French c'est la taure, "it's the heifer".

A word I love for the way it feels when I speak it, for its sound, the way it rolls out of my mouth...for all its meanings...verb, noun, past and present tense...is cure. Such a simple word with multiple meanings and I don't think I've ever used it writing.

Is that the South American volcanoes poem, Ann?

Yup. 'Tis.

I agree, but I'm also a huge fan of the pop/rock group, The Cure, so that connotation might make me biased.

Duncan

I think that you are just envious of P.R.'s .... reputation. Still, that's OK.