More longest words

LONG WORDS - CHEMICAL NAMES
Shown below is a 1,185-letter chemical term for "Tobacco Mosaic Virus, Dahlemense Stain." This word has appeared in the American Chemical Society's Chemical Abstracts and is considered by some to be the longest real word.
ACETYLSERYLTYROSYLSERYLISOLEUCYL-
THREONYLSERYLPROLYLSERYLGLUTAMINYL-
PHENYLALANYLVALYLPHENYLALANYLLEUCYL-
SERYLSERYLVALYLTRYPTOPHYLALANYL-
ASPARTYLPROLYLISOLEUCYLGLUTAMYLLEUCYL-
LEUCYLASPARAGINYLVALYLCYSTEINYL-
THREONYLSERYLSERYLLEUCYLGLYCYL-
ASPARAGINYLGLUTAMINYLPHENYLALANYL-
GLUTAMINYLTHREONYLGLUTAMINYLGLUTAMINYL-
ALANYLARGINYLTHREONYLTHREONYL-
GLUTAMINYLVALYLGLUTAMINYLGLUTAMINYL-
PHENYLALANYLSERYLGLUTAMINYLVALYL-
TRYPTOPHYLLYSYLPROLYLPHENYLALANYL-
PROLYLGLUTAMINYLSERYLTHREONYLVALYL-
ARGINYLPHENYLALANYLPROLYLGLYCYL-
ASPARTYLVALYLTYROSYLLYSYLVALYLTYROSYL-
ARGINYLTYROSYLASPARAGINYLALANYLVALYL-
LEUCYLASPARTYLPROLYLLEUCYLISOLEUCYL-
THREONYLALANYLLEUCYLLEUCYLGLYCYL-
THREONYLPHENYLALANYLASPARTYLTHREONYL-
ARGINYLASPARAGINYLARGINYLISOLEUCYL-
ISOLEUCYLGLUTAMYLVALYLGLUTAMYL-
ASPARAGINYLGLUTAMINYLGLUTAMINYLSERYL-
PROLYLTHREONYLTHREONYLALANYLGLUTAMYL-
THREONYLLEUCYLASPARTYLALANYLTHREONYL-
ARGINYLARGINYLVALYLASPARTYLASPARTYL-
ALANYLTHREONYLVALYLALANYLISOLEUCYL-
ARGINYLSERYLALANYLASPARAGINYLISOLEUCYL-
ASPARAGINYLLEUCYLVALYLASPARAGINYL-
GLUTAMYLLEUCYLVALYLARGINYLGLYCYL-
THREONYLGLYCYLLEUCYLTYROSYLASPARAGINYL-
GLUTAMINYLASPARAGINYLTHREONYL-
PHENYLALANYLGLUTAMYLSERYLMETHIONYL-
SERYLGLYCYLLEUCYLVALYLTRYPTOPHYL-
THREONYLSERYLALANYLPROLYLALANYLSERINE

The spelling of the above word was taken from The Insomniac's Dictionary by Paul Hellweg. The spelling was corrected on March 29, 2000; there was a missing L in the next-to-last line. Thanks to Eric T. Ferguson, who spotted the error, and who, in fact, has suggested that the "word" be deleted from the website. He writes, "Your example is irrelevant. Any protein of known composition can be written out like this; the maximum length is indeterminate: just depends on how long a protein someone has decoded. Nobody ever writes out the name in this way. The same applies for DNA sequencs, never written out in words but only in code letters. I suggest you drop the example."

There are two artificial terms describing complex chemical compounds which have appeared in the Guinness Book of World Records. However these "words" have never been used by chemists and have never appeared in a chemical book or paper. Thus, they have been withdrawn from Guinness.

One is a 3,641-letter chemical name describing bovine NADP-specific glutamate dehydrogenase, which contains 500 amino acids.

The other, which appears below, is supposed to be a 1,913-letter chemical name for the tryptophan synthetase A protein:

methionylglutaminylarginyltyrosylglutamylserylleucylphenylalanylalanylglutaminyll eucyllysylglutamylarginyllysylglutamylglycylalanylphenylalanylvalylprolylphenylal anylvalylthreonylleucylglycylaspartylprolylglycylisoleucylglutamylglutaminylseryl leucyllysylisoleucylaspartylthreonylleucylisoleucylglutamylalanylglycylalanylaspa rtylalanylleucylglutamylleucylglycylisoleucylprolylphenylalanylserylaspartylproly lleucylalanylaspartylglycylprolylthreonylisoleucylglutaminylasparaginylalanylthre onylleucylarginylalanylphenylalanylalanylalanylglycylvalylthreonylprolylalanylglu taminylcysteinylphenylalanylglutamylmethionylleucylalanylleucylisoleucylarginylgl utaminyllysylhistidylprolylthreonylisoleucylprolylisoleucylglycylleucylleucylmeth ionyltyrosylalanylasparaginylleucylvalylphenylalanylasparaginyllysylglycylisoleuc ylaspartylglutamylphenylalanyltyrosylalanylglutaminylcysteinylglutamyllysylvalylg lycylvalylaspartylserylvalylleucylvalylalanylaspartylvalylprolylvalylglutaminylgl utamylserylalanylprolylphenylalanylarginylglutaminylalanylalanylleucylarginylhist idylasparaginylvalylalanylprolylisoleucylphenylalanylisoleucylcysteinylprolylprol ylaspartylalanylaspartylaspartylaspartylleucylleucylarginylglutaminylisoleucylala nylseryltyrosylglycylarginylglycyltyrosylthreonyltyrosylleucylleucylserylarginyla lanylglycylvalylthreonylglycylalanylglutamylasparaginylarginylalanylalanylleucylp rolylleucylasparaginylhistidylleucylvalylalanyllysylleucyllysylglutamyltyrosylasp araginylalanylalanylprolylprolylleucylglutaminylglycylphenylalanylglycylisoleucyl serylalanylprolylaspartylglutaminylvalyllysylalanylalanylisoleucylaspartylalanylg lycylalanylalanylglycylalanylisoleucylserylglycylserylalanylisoleucylvalyllysylis oleucylisoleucylglutamylglutaminylhistidylasparaginylisoleucylglutamylprolylgluta myllysylmethionylleucylalanylalanylleucyllysylvalylphenylalanylvalylglutaminylpro
lylmethionyllysylalanylalanylthreonylarginylserine

Fredrik Viklund writes, "Chemical terms should not in my opinion be listed as long words. Many, many compounds are so complex that their names would be horrific and probably beat the ones listed in all known sources. It is exceedingly hard to reconstruct the correct structure from the name, and many attempts are made to automate the process from structure to name and vice versa. Some systems are successful and commonly used in database searching. The long words starting with ACETYL-SERYL-TYROSYL-SERYL- methionyl-glutaminyl-arginyl-tyrosyl-glutamyl- are spelled-out versions of the amino acid sequence of proteins. To have the longest word, it would only require finding a larger protein, and as proteins are discovered at a rate of hundreds to thousands per week it wouldn't be sporty to accept those names as 'words.' Similar spelling-out for DNA sequences would yield even longer words as the DNA is continous for up to several hundred million bases where each base would be named something like 'uracilphosphate.'"

John Carroll provides the word DIISOBUTYLPHENOXYETHOXYETHYLDIMETHYLBENZYLAMMONIUMCHLORIDE.

LONG WORDS - PLACE NAMES
LLANFAIRPWLLGWYNGYLLGOGERYCHWYRNDROBWLLLLANTYSILIOGOGOGOCH is according to one source the longest placename in the world, with 58 letters. It is a town in North Wales meaning "St. Mary's Church in the hollow of the white hazel near to the rapid whirlpool of Llantysilio of the red ****" or "St. Mary's (Church) by the white aspen over the whirlpool, and St. Tysilio's (Church) by the red ****" in Welsh.
A website at http://llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch.co.uk/ has more information and claims the village is the longest name in Britain and that this address is the longest URL on the web.

Dale Williams of New Zealand says that the Welsh placename is a nineteenth-century fabrication, adopted to look good on their railway place boards, whereas a Maori name for a hill in New Zealand is genuine and was in general use. It has 85 letters: TAUMATAWHAKATANGIHANGAKOAUAUOTAMATEATURIPUKAKAPIKI- MAUNGAHORONUKUPOKAIWHENUAKITANATAHU. Williams says, "If we want to go there now we call it Taumata." New Zealand broadcaster Henare Te Ua says the word celebrates the prowess of a great Maori chief who possessed enormous personal power. Chief Tamatea was so mighty and powerful that, metaphorically, he could even eat mountains. There was a gentle side to his personality too. He could play his nose flute beautifully and quite charmingly to his loved ones. The word, Henare said, means "The summit of the hill, where Tamatea, who is known as the land eater, slid down, climbed up and swallowed mountains, played on his nose flute to his loved one." The hill, about 1000 feet in height, is in Southern Hawke's Bay, a district on the eastern side of the north island. [Neil Carleton] [Note: The spelling of this word was corrected on July 4, 2000. Prior to that date, the "o" preceding "tamatea" was missing. Thanks to Robert Love for pointing out this error. The word as spelled above now has 85 letters and agrees with the spelling in the 1992 Guinness Book of Records.]

There is a 66-letter place name in Wales, according to Dr. David Crystal's Encyclopedia of Language: GORSAFAWDDACHAIDRAIGODANHEDDOGLEDDOLONPENRHYNAREURDRAETHCEREDIGION, meaning "the Mawddach station and its dragon teeth at the Northern Penrhyn Road on the golden beach of Cardigan bay."

According to The Book of Names by J. N. Hook, the longest place name in the U. S. may be NUNATHLOOGAGAMIUTBINGOI, the name of some dunes in Alaska, taken from Eskimo.

However, in Massachusetts, there is Lake CHARGOGAGOGMANCHARGOGAGOGCHARBUNAGUNGAMOG, usually listed on maps as "Lake Webster." It supposedly means "You fish on your side, I'll fish on my side, nobody fish in the middle."

A reader of this page suggests the word is spelled CHARGOGGAGOGGMANCHAUGGAGOGGCHAUBUNAGUNGAMOGG. Mrs. Byrne's Dictionary spells the word CHARGOGGAGOGGMANCHAUGGAGOGGCHAUBUNAGUNGAMAUGG.

However, another reader of this page writes: "I live in Dudley, MA, just west of Webster, MA. and I can verify that the lake is spelled Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchabunagungamaugg by the locals. Also, it doesn't supposedly mean anything. Nobody knows what it means. the 'i fish on my side....' or 'Neutral fishing ground' are just common guesses. From what I've learned, people that have attempted translations learned that it has nothing to do with fishing at all, but the 'neutral borders' might be a closer translation, as it's at the boundary of where a few Indian tribes once lived."

The longest place-name in the world is the full name for Bangkok, the capital city of Thailand: KRUNGTHEP MAHANAKHON BOVORN RATANAKOSIN MAHINTHARAYUTTHAYA MAHADILOKPOP NOPARATRATCHATHANI BURIROM UDOMRATCHANIVETMAHASATHAN AMORNPIMAN AVATARNS ATHIT SAKKATHATTIYAVISNUKARMPRASIT, meaning "The land of angels, the great city (of) immortality, various of devine gems, the great angelic land unconquerable, land of nine noble gems, the royal city, the pleasant capital, place of the grand royal palace, forever land of angels and reincarnated spirits, predestined and created by the highest Deva(s)." [Stuart Kidd; name taken from Guinness Book of Records, the meaning taken from http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Flats/1233/bkk.htm]

EL PUEBLO DE NUESTRA SENORA LA REINA DE LOS ANGELES DE PORCIUNCULA. The name Los Angeles is Spanish for The Angels. There is much more to this name, however. On Wednesday, August 2, 1769, Father Juan Crespi, a Franciscan priest accompanying the first European land expe***ion through California, led by Captain Fernando Rivera Y Moncado, described in his journal a "beautiful river from the northwest" located at "34 degrees 10 minutes." They named the river Nuestra Seủora de los Angeles de la Porciỳncula. In the Franciscan calendar, August 2 was the day of the celebration of the feast of the Perdono at the tiny Assisi chapel of St. Francis of Assisi. Early in St. Francis' life, the Benedictines had given him this tiny chapel for his use near Assisi. The chapel, ruined and in need of repair, was located on what the Italians called a porziuncola or "very small parcel of land." Painted on the wall behind the altar was a fresco of the Virgin Mary surrounded by angels. Now contained within a Basilica, the chapel was named Saint Mary of the Angels at the Little Portion. The newly discovered "beautiful river" was named in honor of this celebration and this chapel. In 1781, a new settlement was established along that river. The settlement came to be known as El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora la Reina de los Angeles de Porciỳncula or The Town of Our Lady the Queen of Angels of the Little Portion although its official name was simply El Pueblo de la Reina de Los Angeles [from http://www.losangelesalmanac.com/topics/History/hi03a.htm] The full name of Los Angeles, El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora la Reina de los Angeles de Porciỳncula, can be abbreviated to 3.63% of its size: L.A. [Stuart Kidd].

The shortest placenames in the U. S. may be L (a lake in Nebraska) and T (a gulch in Colorado), each named for its shape, and D (a river in Oregon flowing from Devil's Lake to the Ocean near Lincoln City). According to Howard Lewis, the D River is the shortest river in the world. There are villages called A (with a ring over the A) in Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, a Y in France, and U in the Pacific Caroline Islands.

The only one-letter placename in the index of the Rand McNally International Atlas is A, a peak in Hong Kong (although the Atlas shows political units named with Roman numerals).

LONG WORDS
PNEUMONOULTRAMICROSCOPICSILICOVOLCANOCONIOSIS (45 letters; a lung disease caused by breathing in certain particles) is the longest word in any English-language dictionary. (It is also spelled -koniosis.)
On Feb. 23, 1935, the New York Herald-Tribune reported on page 3:

Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanokoniosis succeeded electrophotomicrographically as the longest word in the English language recognized by the National Puzzlers' League at the opening session of the organization's 103d semi-annual meeting held yesterday at the Hotel New Yorker.
The puzzlers explained that the forty-five-letter word is the name of a special form of silicosis caused by ultra-microscopic particles of siliceous volcanic dust.

The word appears in the 1936 Supplement to OED1, the OED2, the addendum to W2 (spelled -koniosis), W3 (spelled -coniosis), RHUD2, and Chambers.
The OED2 has:

pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis (-koniosis), a factitious word alleged to mean 'a lung disease caused by the inhalation of very fine silica dust' but occurring chiefly as an instance of a very long word.
1936 F. Scully Bedside Manna 87 *Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanakoniosis [sic], a disease caused by ultra-microscopic particles of sandy volcanic dust, might give even him laryngitis.
1966 Word Study Oct. 7/2 The resources of Greek have enriched the modern world as well as the ancient one. Perhaps this is most dramatically illustrated by the longest and most fantastic word now in an English dictionary (the Merriam-Webster's great Unabridged) which is forty-five letters in length: pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis,..meaning 'a disease of the lungs caused by extremely small particles of ash and dust'.
1973 R. Megarry Second Miscellany-at-Law 160 It has been said that 'floccinaucinihilipilification' is the longest word in the English language... The word's proud title must yield to some technical terms, such as pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanokoniosis.
The following appeared in a post in alt.usage.english:
I conjecture that this "word" was coined by word puzzlers, who then worked assiduously to get it into the major unabridged dictionaries (perhaps with a wink from the e***ors?) to put an end to the endless squabbling about what is the longest word.
Karl F. Lingenfelder reports that the domain name pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis.com was registered on October 28, 1999, and that when activated it will point to http://www.mauigateway.com/~team/longestwordinenglish/ This is a commercial website selling domain names.
TETRAMETHYLDIAMINOBENZHYDRYLPHOSPHINOUS ACID (39 letters in the first word) appears in the OED2 in a citation for another word; this word itself is not a vocabulary entry.

HEPATICOCHOLANGIOCHOLECYSTENTEROSTOMIES (37 letters; surgical creation of a connection between the gall bladder and a hepatic duct and between the intestine and the gall bladder) is the longest word in Gould's Medical Dictionary.

FORMALDEHYDETETRAMETHYLAMIDOFLUORIMUM (37 letters) is in the OED2.

DIMETHYLAMIDOPHENYLDIMETHYLPYRAZOLONE (37 letters) is in the OED2.

SUPERCALIFRAGILISTICEXPIALIDOCIOUS (34 letters) from the movie Mary Poppins is not the longest word in English, although many people believe it is. The word is in the OED, which has the following as the first four citations:

1949 Parker & Young (unpublished song-title) Supercalafajalistickespialadojus.
1951 Parker & Young (song-title) Supercalafajalistickespeealadojus; or, The super song.
1964 R. M. & R. B; Sherman (song-title) Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious!
1967 Decisions U.S. Courts involving Copyright 1965-66 488 The complaint alleges copyright infringement of plaintiff's song `Supercalafajalistickespeealadojus' by defendants' song 'Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.' (All variants of this tongue twister will hereinafter be referred to collectively as 'the word'.)
(The definition says Disney won, "in view of earlier oral uses of the word sworn to in affidavits" and because they wrote the rest of the song themselves.)
DICHLORODIPHENYLTRICHLOROETHANE (31 letters; usually abbreviated DDT) is the longest word in the Macquarie Dictionary and is in the OED2.

FLOCCINAUCINIHILIPILIFICATION (29 letters; an estimation of something as worthless) is the longest word in the first e***ion of the Oxford English Dictionary. In this word the letter i occurs nine times, but e, the most commonly used letter in English, does not occur.

The word dates back to 1741. It has been used by Sir Walter Scott and Senators Robert Byrd and Daniel Patrick Moynihan. It was used by Senator Jesse Helms in 1999 during the debate on the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty [Randolph V. Cinco].

It also appeared on March 14, 1996, in "Zippy," a comic strip distributed by King Features Syndicate:

Do you think I may be too quick to find fault with things and people, Zippy?
Yeh.
Th' 'floccinaucinihilipilification' process.
Th' what?
Floccinaucinihilipilification!! It means 'the estimation of something as valueless'!
You've been randomly reading th' dictionary, haven't you?
Yes. That and my natural tendency toward antifloccinaucinihilipilification!!
Floccinaucinihilipilification was also used by Press Secretary Mike McCurry in his December 6, 1995, White House Press Briefing in discussing Congressional Budget Office estimates and assumptions: "But if you -- as a practical matter of estimating the economy, the difference is not great. There's a little bit of floccinaucinihilipilification going on here."
The 1992 Guinness Book of World Records calls floccinaucinihilipilification "the longest real word in the Oxford English Dictionary," whereas it calls pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis "the longest made-up word in the Oxford English Dictionary."

TRINITROPHENYLMETHYLNITRAMINE (29 letters; a type of explosive) is the longest chemical term in W3.

ANTIDISESTABLISHMENTARIANISM (28 letters) may be the best-known long word. The word means "the belief which opposes removing the tie between church and state."

PARADIMETHYLAMINOBENZALDEHYD (28 letters) is the name of a chemical substance and is found on several Internet web pages [Richard Eisenberger].

HONORIFICABILITUDINITATIBUS (27 letters) is the longest word used by Shakespeare. It appears in Love's Labor's Lost, Act V, Scene I, and is spoken by Costard:

O, they have lived long on the alms-basket of words.
I marvel thy master hath not eaten thee for a word;
for thou art not so long by the head as
honorificabilitudinitatibus: thou art easier
swallowed than a flap-dragon.
Both W1 and W2, which include every word used by Shakespeare, define the word as "honorableness" and label it a "pedantic nonsense word." It is the ablative plural of the Latin contrived honorificabilitudinitas, which is an extension of honorificabilis meaning "honorableness." It first occurs in English in 1599, used by Thomas Nashe. The letters can be rearranged to give "Hi ludi F. Baconis nati tuiti orbi," meaning, "These plays, F. Bacon's offspring, are preserved for the world." This fact has been cited by proponents of the theory that Francis Bacon actually wrote Shakespeare's plays.
The next-longest words used by Shakespeare are ANTHROPOPHAGINIAN, INDISTINGUISHABLE, and UNDISTINGUISHABLE (all with 17 letters) and INCOMPREHENSIBLE and NORTHAMPTONSHIRE (both with 16 letters) [Nelson H. F. Beebe].

ELECTROENCEPHALOGRAPHICALLY and ETHYLENEDIAMINETETRAACETATE (27 letters) are the longest words without spaces or hyphens in MWCD10.

ETHYLENEDIAMINETETRAACETATE, HYDROXYDESOXYCORTICOSTERONE, and OCTAMETHYLPYROPHOSPHORAMIDE (all with 27 letters) are tied for second-longest chemical term in W3.

METHYLCHLOROISOTHIAZOLINONE (27 letters) is found in Pert Plus shampoo, according to John Carroll.

ANTITRANSUBSTANTIATIONALIST (27 letters; one who doubts that consecrated bread and wine actually change into the body and blood of Christ).

ETHYLENEDIAMINETETRAACETIC ACID (26 letters in the first word) is in MWCD10. The substance is abbreviated EDTA.

ANHYDROHYDROXYPROGESTERONE (26 letters; a synthetic crystalline female *** hormone) is the third-longest chemical term in W3.

CYSTOURETEROPYELONEPHRITIS (26 letters; a combined inflammation of the urinary bladder, ureters, and kidneys) is a long medical term mentioned by Paul Hellweg in The Insomniac's Dictionary.

DISPROPORTIONABLENESS and INCOMPREHENSIBILITIES (21 letters) are described by the 1992 Guinness Book of World Records as "the longest words in common use."

SUPEREXTRAORDINARISIMO is the longest word in Spanish, according to Guinness 1995. However, the legitimacy of this word is open to dispute. Nidia Cobiella points out that there are numerous similarly-formed questionable words, such as superextraordinariamente, superespectacularisimo, otorrinolaringologistico, endocrinologicamente, apesadumbradisimamente, descontaminadamente, requeterequeteacostumbrado, sobreabundantisimamente, superimaginariamente, superexcelentisimamente, superpsicoanalisticamente, and desconsideradisimamente. SUPERCALIFRAGILISTICOESPIALIDOSO (from Mary Poppins) has also been suggested. The legitimate words OTORRINOLARINGOLOGIA and OTORRINOLARINGOLOGO could also lead *****perotorrinolaringologo and superotorrinolaringologisimo.

ANTICONSTITUTIONNELLEMENT is the longest official word in French [Jacques Raymond Kilchoởr].

NEBEPASIKISKIAKOPUSTELIAUJANCIUOSIUOSE (38 letters) is possibly the longest Lithuanian word that can be formed according to legal grammatical rules (so it can't be regarded as completely coined). It means "in those, of masculine gender, who aren't gathering wood sorrel by themselves anymore." The meaning is obscure but possible, e.g. in a fairy tale about hares: "A terrible hunger arose in the [long word] hares" [Juozas Rimas].

IRAPUSATINKAATSEMPOKITASANOIGAVETAPAAKEMPAROROKARITYO is the longest word in Matsigenka (also spelled Machiguenga). It means: They will probably really go head over heels into the water when they arrive but not stay that way [Pierre Abbat].

INCONSTITUCIONALISSIMAMENTE (27 letters) is the longest word in Portuguese. It is translated "in a way that really goes against the constitution" [Carlos Andre Branco].

PRIJESTOLONASLIJEDNIKOVICA (26 letters) is a Croatian word meaning "the wife of a heir to the throne" [Vjekoslav Babic].

ZAGIPNOTIZIROVAVSHEMUSYA (22 letters) is a long Russian word meaning "to him who has hypnotized himself" [Pierre Abbat].

ầEKOSLOVAKYALILASTIRAMADIKLARIMIZDANMISINIZ (43 letters, 18 syllables) is usually cited as the longest word in Turkish. It translates as "are you one of the people whom we couldn't Czechoslovakianize (i.e. make into a Czechoslovakian)"? However, the last seven letters are usually printed as a separate word [Edward Sawyer].

NAJNEOBHOSPODAROVAVATELNEJSIEHO (31 letters) is the longest Slovak word, according to Miroslav Sedivy, who reports it means "of the less cultivable" (about a field).

According to Richard Eisenberger, the longest word in the Dutch language that is officially recognized and found in dictionaries is WAPENSTILSTANDSONDERHANDELINGEN (negotiations about cease fire treaties).

In a post in sci.math in 1995, Matthew P. Wiener suggested that the longest word in mathematics that is an accepted standard term is RHOMBICOSIDODECAHEDRON. He listed these other long mathematical words of dubious vali***y: DODECAHEMIDODECAHEDRON, DODECICOSIDODECAHEDRON, ICOSICOSIDODECAHEDRON, ICOSIDODECADODECAHEDRON, PSEUDODIFFERENTIABILITY, QUASIRHOMBICOSIDODECAHEDRON, and SUPERRENORMALIZABILITY.

Fredrik Viklund found LGTRYCKSKVICKSILVERNGURLADDNINGSANORDNING in a Swedish patent application from approximately 1910-1930. It referred to what is now called a "lysrửr" in common language. It means "Low pressure quicksilver vapour discharge apparatus."

SMILES is supposed to be the longest word in the dictionary because "there's a mile between the two S's." Randal J. May points out that adding one letter to SMILE adds two syllables (in forming SIMILE).

According to Red Skelton, the longest word is the word that follows the announcement, "And now a word from our sponsor"!



MILOU