New English Words Quiz: Summer 2010
Created | Updated Jan 16, 2011
New English Word Quiz - Summer 2010
Thank you for all the comments you posted on the previous quiz (Winter 2010). While we wait for the next dictionary update in March, I thought I'd post a retrospective quiz containing words from years gone past. Actually, it's not even one year past: these words were all added in June 2010.
The Oxford English Dictionary is the unrivalled reference to the meaning, history and pronunciation of the English language. It defines over half a million words, and lists 2.5 million quotations to illustrate their meanings. Its ten volumes took 50 years to compile.
These days, the OED's lexicographers publish quarterly updates to the online edition. On 1st June, 2010, they reviewed and updated, among other sequences, all the words lying alphabetically between 'Rh' and 'rococoesque'. In so doing, they spruced up entries like 'ride', 'ring' and 'rise', as well as 'rhinoceros', 'rock and roll' and 'rocket'. Among the more common new words they added in this sequence were 'rhinosinusitis' and 'ring tone'.
They also added a small batch of new words from across the alphabet, one of the the best known of which was 'scissors paper stone'. Now, I actually prefer to play this game as the variant 'cow bomb lake' (cow drinks lake, lake envelops bomb, bomb blows up cow). The actions are self-explanatory: two fingers pointing from the forehead make horns for the cow (or you can just bellow a loud 'moo'); Make yourself very fat and puff up your cheeks for the bomb; and spread your arms wide for the lake - undulating a flat palm like a cricket umpire signalling four runs is an alternative action. I hope to see this popular variation enshrined in the dictionary some time soon.
The other new words added to the OED in this update were maybe a little more obscure, but how many of them can you identify? I've listed 20 of the new words added in June 2010, and have given four possible definitions for each one - can you spot the correct one?
You'll find the answers at the foot of the page, but no peeking until you've guessed them all!
1. halirift
a) a card game
b) good humour
c) a nun's veil
d) a sailing boat
2. jatropha
a) a Caucasian dwelling
b) insanity
c) a spinal injury
d) a tropical shrub
3. leucon
a) a cooking utensil
b) a musical instrument
c) a type of sponge
d) a UV-protective coating
4. rasta roko
a) a Malaysian curry
b) a medicine bag
c) a nuclear test site
d) a street protest
5. rhandir
a) an Asian unit of currency
b) the caribou
c) a lentil
d) a measure of land
6. rhedarium
a) an ant colony
b) a carriage workshop
c) a type of cell wall
d) a vine garden
7. rhingyll
a) a bailiff
b) a sea-bird
c) a stitched hem
d) a vegetable dye
8. rhoptry
a) an agricultural tool
b) a civil servant
c) an organelle
d) a three-dimensional figure
9. rhythmica
a) a gecko
b) a nightclub
c) the science of rhythm
d) a type of marble
10. riad
a) an astronomically large number
b) a construction worker
c) a Moroccan garden
d) a variety of poppy
11. ribaldo
a) a deep-sea cod
b) fringe theatre
c) a fungal skin disease
d) a gentleman
12. ridibund
a) happy
b) a North American tree
c) obsolete
d) opposed to change
13. rifferama
a) a bird of paradise
b) a concave surface
c) gratuitous musical improvisation
d) a seascape
14. rigolet
a) an architectural moulding
b) an eyespot on a butterfly's wing
c) a printer's tool
d) a stream
15. rikishi
a) a braided jacket
b) a chef
c) a stadium
d) a sumo wrestler
16. rincon
a) an anti-cancer drug
b) the honey buzzard
c) a mineral ore
d) a secluded piece of land
17. ripstaver
a) a beetle
b)
an impressive person
c) a move in surfing
d) a stanchion on a biplane
18. robalo
a) a beach bar
b) a circus performer
c) a detective
d) an edible fish
19. robug
a) a geometric puzzle
b) a quad bike
c) a small robot
d) a system error
20. stonerock
a) a crag
b) a drug addict
c) a freshwater plant
d) a genre of blues music
Solutions
1c 2d 3c 4d 5d 6b 7a 8c 9c 10c 11a 12a 13c 14d 15d 16d 17b 18d 19c 20a
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