These 10 Words Have the Most Definitions in English

18 September 2018 William H. Gould Word Definitions 0

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Set yourself down and prepare to run through the list of English words that go above and beyond when it comes to different definitions. These words aren’t afraid to take a stand and get recognized for their incredible flexibility. Whether you’ve got a knack for the turn of a phrase or you’ve just put your foot in your mouth again, this fall is the perfect time to strike your vocab-building goals. Here are the 10 English words with the most definitions — words that played roles in this paragraph in order, by the way.

Word Wars

Ranking these words should be pretty easy, right? Just open up the dictionary and see which word has the longest entry. Okay … but which dictionary? And from what year? You see where the complications lie. Well, there’s one authoritative source that has put its foot down: the Guinness Book of World Records. It looks to the Oxford English Dictionary, arguably the definitive source for what is and isn’t a word in English. In the most recent physical edition of that dictionary, the longest entry goes to the word “set,” with a staggering 430 different definitions. Think about it — you can set a set of dishes on the table set at a set time. Okay, great, case closed!

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