TIL Shakespeare invented a ton of common words

  • 4 Replies
  • 7182 Views
TIL Shakespeare invented a ton of common words
« on: March 19, 2020, 11:26:17 am »
Apparently Shakespeare invented over 1700 words or at least used them for the first time in a recorded piece of literature. What's your favorite?

https://www.nosweatshakespeare.com/resources/words-shakespeare-invented/

Quote
accommodation   aerial   amazement   apostrophe   assassination   auspicious   baseless   bloody   bump   
castigate   changeful   clangor   control (noun)   countless   courtship   critic   critical   dexterously   
dishearten   dislocate   dwindle   eventful   exposure   fitful   frugal   generous   gloomy   gnarled   hurry   
impartial   inauspicious   indistinguishable   invulnerable   lapse   laughable   lonely   majestic   misplaced   
monumental   multitudinous   obscene   palmy   perusal   pious   premeditated   radiance   reliance   road   
sanctimonious   seamy   sportive   submerge   suspicious   

I think I'm gonna go with obscene. But seriously, how was road not a word???
*spork*

Re: TIL Shakespeare invented a ton of common words
« Reply #1 on: March 19, 2020, 11:29:11 am »
Also upstairs and downstairs, amongst a LOT of others. (Also, the site says that Shakespeare is the *first written record* we have of these words, and many were almost certainly in common usage before he used them.)

Also also, you didn't learn this stuff in middle school when you read your first Shakespeare plays?
signatures

Re: TIL Shakespeare invented a ton of common words
« Reply #2 on: March 19, 2020, 11:41:36 am »
Also upstairs and downstairs, amongst a LOT of others. (Also, the site says that Shakespeare is the *first written record* we have of these words, and many were almost certainly in common usage before he used them.)

Also also, you didn't learn this stuff in middle school when you read your first Shakespeare plays?

I never paid attention in English class. That shit was boring as hell
*spork*

Re: TIL Shakespeare invented a ton of common words
« Reply #3 on: March 19, 2020, 11:54:31 am »
I loved English; it was the one subject outside of science in which I felt I had real talent. Not necessarily literature, per se (largely because many of the authors they had us read SUCKED; Nathaniel Hawthorne in particular was a horrible author and should be relegated to well-deserved obscurity), but I adored widening my lexicon, improving my eloquence, and generally finding new forms of linguistic expression.
signatures

Re: TIL Shakespeare invented a ton of common words
« Reply #4 on: March 20, 2020, 02:50:43 pm »
whenever someone gives me shit for using "fake words", i bring up shakespeare. shits splenderificous.
m'lady