The longest word in the English language is disputed, with many candidates, most not in common use. The current longest word is pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanokoniosis, but other longer words exist, including a Greek term and a word created by James Joyce. The longest word ever created has over two million letters and is not listed in dictionaries. Long words often involve scientific names or constructions with Latin or Greek word lists and prefixes or suffixes. The longest word in the world is subject to change, as someone may create a longer word to earn a new record.
There is a big dispute over the longest word in the world, as well as in the English language. Many words are good candidates, but most of them are not in common use. Antidisestablishmentarianism was said to be the longest word in English, but it has been replaced by other words such as pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanokoniosis, which has 45 letters and describes a lung disease.
The word is unlikely to fall into common usage, and there have been other, longer words, including the 52-letter word osteocarnisanguineviscerartilaginnervomedullary, used in Thomas Love’s Peacock novel Headlong Hall. Not surprisingly, this long word, describing various components of the body, did not become the last slang term after the 1816 novel was published.
Writers have a habit of inventing very long words and one of the examples of longest words is a Greek term created by playwright Aristophanes. The term describes a dish of food in the play The Assemblywomen and is loosely transliterated as follows: Lopadotemachose lachogaleokrani oleipsanodrimhypo trimmatosilphioparao melitokatakechymeno kichlepikossyphophatto peristeralektryonoptekeph alliokigklopeleiolag oiositebaphetra. Other long terms include a 101-letter word created by James Joyce.
Nigel Tomm has created the most amazing of these words. It appears in his tenth volume of The Blah Story published in 2008. The word contains over two million letters, and again is not likely to be repeated, or possibly even read aloud. It is currently the longest word in the world, although it is not listed in dictionaries.
Other long words include the New Zealand name for a hill, Taumatawha-katangihangakoauauotamateaturipukakapikimaungahoronukupokaiwenuakitanatahu. Typically, aside from a few toponyms and writers’ creations, the largest words are generated from scientific names. The chemical name of the largest protein contains over 180,000 letters.
One of the longest words in English that deserves honorable mention is floccinaucinihilipilification, which is listed in the Oxford English Dictionary and has been in use since the 1700s. It is the act of judging something as worthless. It does occasionally see use by the public, although this is rare.
Some of the longer word types involve constructions with a Latin or Greek word list, as in pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanokoniosis, and a variety of prefixes or suffixes. The prefixes can cancel each other out in the case of words like antidisestablishmentarianism, which loosely translates to anti-establishmentarianism.
Other words simply create a broad description of something by stringing together numerous words. Although currently the longest word in the world is in English, this is always subject to change. Chances are someone will take Nigel Tomm’s longest word as a challenge and compose one of three million letters or more to earn a new record.
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