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