DIRECTORY OF BEAUTIFUL WORDS
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About Site | What’s New? | Feedback | Help
My Writing Portfolio at www.bykairos.com MAIN DIRECTORY
- Word Lists Home | Featured Word Lists
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- The Beauty of Language and Words - the words we discover and find through reading
- Weaving Meaning in a Web of Words - the words we use for communicating & storytelling
- The Rare and Unusual of Obscurity - bring back the archaic, old fashioned & obsolete
- The Universe and World We Live In - the words in exotic languages new to us
- People, Places and Things - the words we use to understand ourselves & the world around us
- The Colors of Our Creativity - the words we use to create and innovate
- The Dark Side of the Moon - the words of a darker nature
- My Books: Series of Beautiful Words.
- @kairosoflife on Twitter - hashtag #BeautifulWords and Pinterest Boards
Search site below or use Advanced Search to search the site & my vocabulary books.
DIRECTORY OF OBSCURITY
The Old, Rare & Unusual
OBSCURE | WEIRD | OBSOLETE
Obscurity WordMap
WORD LISTS SPECIAL FEATURES WORDS FROM OTHER CATEGORIES ARTICLES FROM THE REFERENCE CENTER:
WEIRD AND WACKY WORDS
strange and bizarre old and rare words
OBSCURITY OF THE NORM
obscure words for the ordinary & normal
THE GREAT RESURRECTION
bringing the best obsolete words back
LEARN ABOUT OBSCURE WORDS
The Word Reference Corner
BASKETS OF BIZARRE
With a Quizzity Word Salad
THESE WORDS MAKE YOU GO HUH?
DICTIONARY DEFINITION
bizarre (adj.)
"fantastical, odd, grotesque," 1640s, from the French bizarre "odd, fantastic" (16c.), from Italian bizarro meaning "irascible, tending to quick flashes of anger" (13c.). The sense in Italian evolved to "unpredictable, eccentric," then to "strange, weird," in which sense it was taken into French and then English.
Bizarre has become subjective so we can it is simply something that makes you go “huh?” Or “LOL.”
We can call these words QUIZZITIES - things that are strange or oddities.
BIZARRE WORDS FOR QUIZZITY IDEAS
AUTOPHOBY - The fear of referring to yourself. The fear of using the pronouns "I" or "Me." A good example is Elmo of Sesame Street. He never says those pronouns!
AXINOMANCY - divination by means of the movements of an ax placed on a post.
See More Divination Words
BUBULCITATE - It means to cry like a cowboy (whatever that is supposed to mean!)
CAPRYLIC - a person who smells like an animal.
CATOPTROMANCY - foretelling the future by means of a mirror.
CEREOLOGY - the study or investigation of crop circles.
CHEVISANCE - to acquire money by hocking something at the local pawn shop or on Pawn Stars if you happen to be in Vegas. Go try the all you can eat buffet at Caesars with your loot.
CROWKEEPER - a person employed to scare off crows. A human scarecrow if you will.
CRYPTOZOOLOGY - the search for and study of animals whose existence is unproven, like the Loch Ness monster or the delightful unicorn.
FLOCCINAUCINIHILI - a worthless word that means the action or habit of estimating something else as worthless.
CURWHIBBLE - a thing-a-ma-jig or a what-ya-ma-callit.
DRAWCANSIR - a person who kills both friends and foes.
ERINACEOUS - this is a strange one that means someone resembles a hedgehog. If someone ever says that you are looking quite erinaceous today, you know now to give them a penetrating, evil glare.
FINNIMBRUN - a knicknack or a trinket. Instead of a "Collectibles Store" you could call it a "Finnimbrun Find."
GARDYLOO - used in Edinburgh as a warning cry when someone threw slop from their windows into the streets below.
GARGALESIS - Psychologists clinically use this term to define “heavy tickling.” Light, feather-like tickling they called KNISMESIS. Apparently, there is a spectrum of tickling levels. GARGALESTHESIA is the umbrella term for any kind of tickling.
GONGOOZLER - a person who sits and stares at activity on a canal. This has been now updated to mean a rubbernecker.
GYASCUTUS - an imaginary large four-legged beast with legs on one side longer than on the other specifically for walking on the hillside.
HALFPACE - a landing, certainly, but not just any landing. It refers to that small landing at the top of a flight of stairs where you have to turn and take another flight of stairs whether going up or down.
HARUSPEX — a religious official in ancient Rome who inspected the entrails of sacrificial animals in order to foretell the future.
HOUGHMANGANDY - sexual intercourse with someone you are not married to. This is a rare word found mostly in Scottish writing of the 18th century. Today we just say someone is a cheater.
ILLATRATION - the act of barking at someone or something.
ILINX - the peculiar satisfaction of picking up a pile of papers and throwing them out of the window or intentionally smashing a delicate china cup. Ilinx (pronounced il-inx) is from the Greek word for whirlpool. French sociologist Roger Caillois defines it as “voluptuous panic,” the sensation of spinning and falling and losing control.
JIRBLE - the action of spilling your drink from unsteady movements, trembling or shaking of the container. This means you are drunk. Call for an Uber and go home.
LYCANTHROPY - the technical term for the supernatural transformation of a person into a wolf.
MUNGO - a person who retrieves valuables from the garbage. Today we call them a "dumpster diver."
MYTACISM - excessive or wrong use of the sound of the letter M.
NUDIUSTERTIAN - simply refers to two days ago (the day before yesterday, in fact).
PNEUMONOULTRAMICROSCOPICSILICOVOLCANOCONIOSIS — an invented term said to mean ‘a lung disease caused by inhaling very fine ash and sand dust’, but rarely used except for its curiosity value.
QUIRE you can have a piece of paper, a pad of paper or a ream of paper. But have you ever wanted to order exactly 24 or 25 sheets of paper without having to say “I would like 24 or 25 sheets of paper, please? Ask for a quire.
PREGUSTATOR - a person whose job it is to taste meats and drinks before serving them. This is performed when there is suspicion of poisoned food or drink. Word of advice, if you suspect your friends have poisoned your dinner then they are not good friends. Don’t call for a pregustator - call the dinner done and run. And get new friends!
QUACKHOODA 19th-century word for charlatanism, or a falsehood - literally, the state of being a “quack.”
RESISTENTIALISM - the theory that inanimate objects demonstrate hostile behavior towards people. So watch the books on your bookshelf.
RESURRECTION MAN - a person who, in past times, illicitly exhumed corpses from burial grounds and sold them to anatomists for dissection.
SCRIPOPHILY - the collection of stocks and bond certificates, not as an investment, but as works of art to hang on the wall.
SELKIE - a mythical sea creature that is half man, half seal.
SKIMMINGTON - a kind of procession once undertaken to make an example of a nagging wife or an unfaithful husband.
SPAGHETTIFICATION - the process by which (in some theories) an object is stretched and ripped apart by gravitational forces on falling into a black hole.
SPANGHEW - to throw a frog violently into the air from the end of a stick. Purpose unknown and kind of rude.
SPHENOPALATINE GANGLIONEURALGIA is the proper, technical term for an ice-cream headache.
TAPPEN - the plug by which the rectum of a bear is closed during hibernation.
TEGESTOLOGY - The collecting of beer mats. Every beer needs a mat.
TITTYNOPE - the scattering of crumbs left on one side of the plate, the dozen or so grains of rice sitting at the bottom of the bowl, or the few drops remaining in the beer, are not mere leftovers or dregs. They are called tittynopes.
TOKOLOSHE - in African folklore, a mischievous and lascivious hairy water sprite toplofty — they are haughty and arrogant.
UROBOROS - a circular symbol depicting a snake (or a dragon) swallowing its tail, intended as an emblem of wholeness or infinity.
WINKLEPICKER - If you ever manage to prepare mollusc skewers using pointy shoes, this will illustrate perfectly the job of a winklepicker. Winklepickers are shoes with such a sharp point that they evoke the utensils used to prise winkles from their shells.
XENOLOGY - the scientific study of extraterrestrial phenomena. Area 51 is full of xenology experts on green little men and they work side by side with CEREOLOGISTS who study or investigate crop circles.
XERTZ - this sounds like the name of the villain in a bad science fiction story - or an evil robot - but it is the act of gulping your drink down in haste.
XYLOMANCY. Imagine you are strolling along a woodland path and a branch drops in front of you. What do you do? You call someone skilled in the art of fortune telling through twigs, branches, or logs. This is called xylomancy and it’s a pseudoscience called a divination. It was part of the curriculum at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, so the scientific predictions measure at a zero percent chance of any accuracy but it would be fun to try.
See More Divination Words
YARBOROUGH - a hand of cards containing no card above a nine. How does anyone get a straight flush to the King if there is no King? Strip go fish is no fun.
ZOANTHROPY - delusion of a person who believes himself to be an animal.
bizarre (adj.)
"fantastical, odd, grotesque," 1640s, from the French bizarre "odd, fantastic" (16c.), from Italian bizarro meaning "irascible, tending to quick flashes of anger" (13c.). The sense in Italian evolved to "unpredictable, eccentric," then to "strange, weird," in which sense it was taken into French and then English.
Bizarre has become subjective so we can it is simply something that makes you go “huh?” Or “LOL.”
We can call these words QUIZZITIES - things that are strange or oddities.
BIZARRE WORDS FOR QUIZZITY IDEAS
AUTOPHOBY - The fear of referring to yourself. The fear of using the pronouns "I" or "Me." A good example is Elmo of Sesame Street. He never says those pronouns!
AXINOMANCY - divination by means of the movements of an ax placed on a post.
See More Divination Words
BUBULCITATE - It means to cry like a cowboy (whatever that is supposed to mean!)
CAPRYLIC - a person who smells like an animal.
CATOPTROMANCY - foretelling the future by means of a mirror.
CEREOLOGY - the study or investigation of crop circles.
CHEVISANCE - to acquire money by hocking something at the local pawn shop or on Pawn Stars if you happen to be in Vegas. Go try the all you can eat buffet at Caesars with your loot.
CROWKEEPER - a person employed to scare off crows. A human scarecrow if you will.
CRYPTOZOOLOGY - the search for and study of animals whose existence is unproven, like the Loch Ness monster or the delightful unicorn.
FLOCCINAUCINIHILI - a worthless word that means the action or habit of estimating something else as worthless.
CURWHIBBLE - a thing-a-ma-jig or a what-ya-ma-callit.
DRAWCANSIR - a person who kills both friends and foes.
ERINACEOUS - this is a strange one that means someone resembles a hedgehog. If someone ever says that you are looking quite erinaceous today, you know now to give them a penetrating, evil glare.
FINNIMBRUN - a knicknack or a trinket. Instead of a "Collectibles Store" you could call it a "Finnimbrun Find."
GARDYLOO - used in Edinburgh as a warning cry when someone threw slop from their windows into the streets below.
GARGALESIS - Psychologists clinically use this term to define “heavy tickling.” Light, feather-like tickling they called KNISMESIS. Apparently, there is a spectrum of tickling levels. GARGALESTHESIA is the umbrella term for any kind of tickling.
GONGOOZLER - a person who sits and stares at activity on a canal. This has been now updated to mean a rubbernecker.
GYASCUTUS - an imaginary large four-legged beast with legs on one side longer than on the other specifically for walking on the hillside.
HALFPACE - a landing, certainly, but not just any landing. It refers to that small landing at the top of a flight of stairs where you have to turn and take another flight of stairs whether going up or down.
HARUSPEX — a religious official in ancient Rome who inspected the entrails of sacrificial animals in order to foretell the future.
HOUGHMANGANDY - sexual intercourse with someone you are not married to. This is a rare word found mostly in Scottish writing of the 18th century. Today we just say someone is a cheater.
ILLATRATION - the act of barking at someone or something.
ILINX - the peculiar satisfaction of picking up a pile of papers and throwing them out of the window or intentionally smashing a delicate china cup. Ilinx (pronounced il-inx) is from the Greek word for whirlpool. French sociologist Roger Caillois defines it as “voluptuous panic,” the sensation of spinning and falling and losing control.
JIRBLE - the action of spilling your drink from unsteady movements, trembling or shaking of the container. This means you are drunk. Call for an Uber and go home.
LYCANTHROPY - the technical term for the supernatural transformation of a person into a wolf.
MUNGO - a person who retrieves valuables from the garbage. Today we call them a "dumpster diver."
MYTACISM - excessive or wrong use of the sound of the letter M.
NUDIUSTERTIAN - simply refers to two days ago (the day before yesterday, in fact).
PNEUMONOULTRAMICROSCOPICSILICOVOLCANOCONIOSIS — an invented term said to mean ‘a lung disease caused by inhaling very fine ash and sand dust’, but rarely used except for its curiosity value.
QUIRE you can have a piece of paper, a pad of paper or a ream of paper. But have you ever wanted to order exactly 24 or 25 sheets of paper without having to say “I would like 24 or 25 sheets of paper, please? Ask for a quire.
PREGUSTATOR - a person whose job it is to taste meats and drinks before serving them. This is performed when there is suspicion of poisoned food or drink. Word of advice, if you suspect your friends have poisoned your dinner then they are not good friends. Don’t call for a pregustator - call the dinner done and run. And get new friends!
QUACKHOODA 19th-century word for charlatanism, or a falsehood - literally, the state of being a “quack.”
RESISTENTIALISM - the theory that inanimate objects demonstrate hostile behavior towards people. So watch the books on your bookshelf.
RESURRECTION MAN - a person who, in past times, illicitly exhumed corpses from burial grounds and sold them to anatomists for dissection.
SCRIPOPHILY - the collection of stocks and bond certificates, not as an investment, but as works of art to hang on the wall.
SELKIE - a mythical sea creature that is half man, half seal.
SKIMMINGTON - a kind of procession once undertaken to make an example of a nagging wife or an unfaithful husband.
SPAGHETTIFICATION - the process by which (in some theories) an object is stretched and ripped apart by gravitational forces on falling into a black hole.
SPANGHEW - to throw a frog violently into the air from the end of a stick. Purpose unknown and kind of rude.
SPHENOPALATINE GANGLIONEURALGIA is the proper, technical term for an ice-cream headache.
TAPPEN - the plug by which the rectum of a bear is closed during hibernation.
TEGESTOLOGY - The collecting of beer mats. Every beer needs a mat.
TITTYNOPE - the scattering of crumbs left on one side of the plate, the dozen or so grains of rice sitting at the bottom of the bowl, or the few drops remaining in the beer, are not mere leftovers or dregs. They are called tittynopes.
TOKOLOSHE - in African folklore, a mischievous and lascivious hairy water sprite toplofty — they are haughty and arrogant.
UROBOROS - a circular symbol depicting a snake (or a dragon) swallowing its tail, intended as an emblem of wholeness or infinity.
WINKLEPICKER - If you ever manage to prepare mollusc skewers using pointy shoes, this will illustrate perfectly the job of a winklepicker. Winklepickers are shoes with such a sharp point that they evoke the utensils used to prise winkles from their shells.
XENOLOGY - the scientific study of extraterrestrial phenomena. Area 51 is full of xenology experts on green little men and they work side by side with CEREOLOGISTS who study or investigate crop circles.
XERTZ - this sounds like the name of the villain in a bad science fiction story - or an evil robot - but it is the act of gulping your drink down in haste.
XYLOMANCY. Imagine you are strolling along a woodland path and a branch drops in front of you. What do you do? You call someone skilled in the art of fortune telling through twigs, branches, or logs. This is called xylomancy and it’s a pseudoscience called a divination. It was part of the curriculum at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, so the scientific predictions measure at a zero percent chance of any accuracy but it would be fun to try.
See More Divination Words
YARBOROUGH - a hand of cards containing no card above a nine. How does anyone get a straight flush to the King if there is no King? Strip go fish is no fun.
ZOANTHROPY - delusion of a person who believes himself to be an animal.
The Old, Rare & Unusual
OBSCURE | WEIRD | OBSOLETE
Obscurity WordMap
A BEAUTIFUL WORD ... a vocabulary site for logophiles, writers and word lovers that is part of
A SERIES OF BEAUTIFUL WORDS
Collection of Vocabulary Books, Sites and Resources
Series Homepage | View Sites | Download Books
Words are also posted on twitter under the hashtags #beautifulwords and #wordoftheday and shared visually on pinterest bulletin boards
ABOUT SITE | SITEMAPS | SEARCH | FEEDBACK
Content by Kairos ~ @kairosoflife
Homepage | Portfolio | Contact
Original content © 2021 Copyright, Kairos
A SERIES OF BEAUTIFUL WORDS
Collection of Vocabulary Books, Sites and Resources
Series Homepage | View Sites | Download Books
Words are also posted on twitter under the hashtags #beautifulwords and #wordoftheday and shared visually on pinterest bulletin boards
ABOUT SITE | SITEMAPS | SEARCH | FEEDBACK
Content by Kairos ~ @kairosoflife
Homepage | Portfolio | Contact
Original content © 2021 Copyright, Kairos
