Or, what was I looking for again?

So I start out researching a bug report and ended up delving into the origins of “supercalifragilisticexpialidocious”. I don’t really consider it web surfing per say, more like taking a web tangent. I start out with every intention of keeping on target but end up with about 15 browser windows open with little to nothing to do with what I started out looking for. So rather than just closing out the group of windows and putting all that random research to waste I figured maybe it would be of use to somebody right? Or not, but what the heck, here it is…

So a bug report for the Bayesian Email filter I use entitled “Ludicrous word count” complained about 10,831 words being identified in a spam filter. I didn’t consider it to be over the top especially since my filters top out at about 82,000 words. So the question of how many words there are in the english language sprung to mind. So here we go.

Total number of words in the English language is a muddled question since there are all sorts of qualifications such as is it a root word, or a slang term or whatever. Beyond all the messing about in terms there are plenty of numbers to look at. The second edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, generally considered to be the most extensive English dictionary, contains 290,000 unique entries with 616,500 word forms. As a matter of course this dictionary does not include most slang, technical terms, and proper names. (It’s not really surprising when you consider that there are about 1.4 million named species of insects alone) General overall word count estimates start at around 3 million and go up from there depending who you read. (my favorite Dictionary search tool OneLook.com claims to have access to 5,239,122 words) In contrast, common use numbers for words are much lower. General estimates are 200,000 commonly used words, average vocabularies top out at 20,000 words and normal day to day conversation uses only about 2,000 words.

Once you delve into it word trivia is quite the cul-de-sac to happen into, my next trip off the mark went into the direction of the longest English word. As before there are certain “what qualifies as a word” agreements we have to get through. The most ridiculous long word example is the chemical name for the tryptophan synthetase A protein, and yes this is the stuff found in turkey that makes you sleepy. It seems you can’t put a list like this together with listing this example so here it is.

methionylglutaminylarginyltyrosylglutamylserylleucylphenylalanyla lanylglutaminylleucyllysylglutamylarginyllysylglutamylglycylalany lphenylalanylvalylprolylphenylalanylvalylthreonylleucylglycylaspa rtylprolylglycylisoleucylglutamylglutaminylserylleucyllysylisoleu cylaspartylthreonylleucylisoleucylglutamylalanylglycylalanylaspar tylalanylleucylglutamylleucylglycylisoleucylprolylphenylalanylser ylaspartylprolylleucylalanylaspartylglycylprolylthreonyliso leucylglutaminylaspfraginylalanylthreonylleucylarginylalanylpheny lalanylalanylalanylglycylvalylthreonylprolylalanylglutaminylcyste inylphenylalanylglutamylmethionylleucylalanylleucylisoleucylargin ylglutaminyllysylhistidylprolylthreonylisoleucylprolylisoleucylgl ycylleucylleucylmethionyltyrosylalanylasparaginylleucylvalylpheny lalanylasparaginyllysylglycylisoleucylaspartylglutamylphenylalany ltyrosylalanylglutaminylcysteinylglutamyllysylvalylglycylva lylaspartylserylvalylleucylvalylalanylaspartylvalylprolylvalylglu taminylglutamylserylalanylprolylphenylalanylarginylglutaminylalan ylalanylleucylarginylhistidylasparaginylvalylalanylprolylisoleucy lphenylalanylisoleucylcysteinylprolylprolylaspartylalanylaspartyl aspartylaspartylleucylleucylarginylglutaminylisoleucylalanylseryl tyrosylglycylarginylglycyltyrosylthreonyltyrosylleucylleucylseryl arginylalanylglycylvalylthreonylglycylalanylglutamylasparag inylarginylalanylalanylleucylprolylleucylasparaginylhistidylleucy lvalylalanyllysylleucyllysylglutamyltyrosylasparaginylalanylalany lprolylprolylleucylglutaminylglycylphenylalanylglycylisoleucylser ylalanylprolylaspartylglutaminylvalyllysylalanylalanylisoleucylas partylalanylglycylalanylalanylglycylalanylisoleucylserylglycylser ylalanylisoleucylvalyllysylisoleucylisoleucylglutamylglutaminylhi stidylasparaginylisoleucylglutamylprolylglutamyllysylmethio nylleucylalanylalanylleucyllysylvalylphenylalanylvalylglutaminylp rolylmethion yllysylalanylalanylthreonylarginylserine. (spaces have been inserted so it will wrap, for some strange reason browers don't handle 1000+ letter words very well)

At 1,913 letters it is quite a mouthful, but expressing a complex chemical formula in this way is a rather inefficient option, not the rule of thumb. In theory you could express the whole human genome in this way but it wouldn’t make a whole lot of sense. Words like this are generally considered “verbal formulas” and not really considered in the context of normal spoken words.

The words osteosarchaematosplanchnochondroneuromuelous (44 letters) and osseocarnisanguineoviscericartilaginonervomedullary (51 letters), which both translate roughly as `of bone, flesh, blood, organs, gristle, nerve, and marrow', are more examples of words that are basically multiple terms strung together. (More “verbal formulas”) The lung disease pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis (45 letters) is the longest word listed in any of the oxford dictionaries, again it is a very obscure technical term, and its common verbal use as a word is questionable at best. The longest words in general use today are floccinaucinihilipilification (29 letters) and antidisestablishmentarianism (28 letters). Floccinaucinihilipilification is “the action or habit of estimating as worthless.” Its use is well documented, but it’s not something I feel you are going to come across often these days. Antidisestablishmentarianism is “opposition to the disestablishment of the Church of England” also used as the opposition to the removal of any established thing. Using “common” here in the most general of ways, but this to my mind is the longest word you are apt to see in common use these days. To be entirely honest both words are recognized by MS/Word as correctly spelled and my bias may be more due to my immediate recognition of antidisestablishmentarianism where I had no clue what the heck floccinaucinihilipilification was about.

Ah yes, but of course I have to mention that damned supercalifragilisticexpialidocious (34 letters), so is that a real word or what? Well again, song title or not, loosely speaking it is a word, but do we really want to include a word made up for a Disney song? Well it seems to have pre-Disney origins of a sort. The song “Supercalafajalistickespialadojus” also known as “The super song” has a registered trademark (RE-9-331) dating back to September 24 1951. The owners of this song sued Disney for their 1964 song and failed, "in view of earlier oral uses of the word sworn to in affidavits". I haven’t been able to find out what the,”earlier oral uses” were definitively. There is an urban myth about the word being a term used by Irish whores to indicate that you want the “works”. There is no evidence I can find for this being true and there are lots of myths like this surrounding Disney in the face of its squeaky clean image. (Cinderella’s Castle at Disney’s Magic Kingdom is an exact copy of one built by the Marquis de Sade, 101 Dalmatians is based on a low-budget Italian horror flick, etc.)

If you want to let the internet do the ranking for you here are the numbers when I “Googled” each of the words.

8,340 – Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious
7,480 – Antidisestablishmentarianism
1,950 - Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis
1,110 – Floccinaucinihilipilification
10 - osseocarnisanguineoviscericartilaginonervomedullary
7 – methionylglutaminylarginyltyrosylglutamylserylleucylphenylalanyla…
3 - osteosarchaematosplanchnochondroneuromuelous

You can pretty much argue for or against any of the words mentioned and be correct. I’m not going to get too much deeper into all this word trivia other than to mention the AskOxford word FAQ. Want to know the proper usage of the word “Ye” or what do you call a group of caterpillars (an Army) or what is the name of the dot above the letter “i” (superscript dot)? It’s all in there and enough to take up more than a couple of afternoons.