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This is a list of English words inherited and derived directly from the Old English stage of the language. This list also includes neologisms formed from Old English roots and/or particles in later forms of English, and words borrowed into other languages (e.g. French, Anglo-French, etc.) then borrowed back into English (e.g. bateau, chiffon, gourmet, nordic, etc.).
The term man (from Proto-Germanic *mann-"person") and words derived from it can designate any or even all of the human race regardless of their sex or age. In traditional usage, man (without an article) itself refers to the species or to humanity (mankind) as a whole. The Germanic word developed into Old English mann. In Old English, the word ...
The abbreviation is not always a short form of the word used in the clue. For example: "Knight" for N (the symbol used in chess notation) Taking this one stage further, the clue word can hint at the word or words to be abbreviated rather than giving the word itself. For example: "About" for C or CA (for "circa"), or RE.
Generally, words coming from French often retain a higher register than words of Old English origin, and they are considered by some to be more posh, elaborate, sophisticated, or pretentious. However, there are exceptions: weep , groom and stone (from Old English) occupy a slightly higher register than cry , brush and rock (from French).
The Historical Thesaurus of English (HTE) is a complete database of all the words in the Oxford English Dictionary and other dictionaries (including Old English), arranged by semantic field and date. In this way, the HTE arranges the whole vocabulary of English, from the earliest written records in Old English to the present, alongside dates of ...
The number of words in the answer is not given in the clue—so a one-word clue can have a multiple-word answer. [28] The theme, if any, will be applied consistently throughout the puzzle; e.g., if one of the theme entries is a particular variety of pun, all the theme entries will be of that type. [9]
Perhaps around 85% of Old English words are no longer in use, but those that survived are the basic elements of Modern English vocabulary. [2] Old English is a West Germanic language, and developed out of North Sea Germanic dialects from the 5th century.
Cryptic crossword clues consist typically of a definition and some type of word play. Cryptic crossword clues need to be viewed two ways. One is a surface reading and one a hidden meaning. [27] The surface reading is the basic reading of the clue to look for key words and how those words are constructed in the clue. The second way is the hidden ...