Another puzzle: should “port of call,” another Websters Third entry, count as a word, even though each of its components is entered separately?
It has been estimated that the vocabulary of English includes roughly 1 million words (although most linguists would take that estimate with a chunk of salt, and some have said they wouldn’t be surprised if it is off the mark by a quarter-million); that tally includes the myriad names of chemicals and other scientific entities. Many of these are so peripheral to common English use that they do not or are not likely to appear even in an unabridged dictionary. Webster’s Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged, together with its 1993 Addenda Section, includes some 470,000 entries. The Oxford English Dictionary, Second Edition, reports that it includes a similar number.
Related Questions
- Is it possible to procure the Clampcrete system components separately from different sources and still achieve the certified crash-tested system?
- Another puzzle: should "port of call," another Websters Third entry, count as a word, even though each of its components is entered separately?
- How to Make a Word Search Puzzle
