The world is not yet exhaused; let me see something tomorrow which I never saw before.
Help celebrate the 300th anniversary of the birth of Dr Samuel Johnson - composer of the first major dictionary of the English Language
Rewrite the dictionary!
Johnson's dictionary contained a whole host of weird and wonderful words, some which are still used today, and some which have now fallen out of use.
As part of the tercentenary celebrations, we've gathered together some of the more unusual words and are asking you to add your own definitions. These needn't be the correct ones, so use your imagination and get defining! Click the list on the right to get started.
The best definitions will be designed and printed on a postcard, which will be on sale around Lichfield.
Send your definitions with Twitter
You can also add your definitions via Twitter, just tweet the word and definition, as well as the 'hashtag' #j09defs from your Twitter account or click 'Tweet this' on the list on the right.
Words
To add your definition of a word, click 'define'. To see what others have added, click 'See definitions'
- Stingo
- Skimbleskamble
- Fopdoodle
- Twangling
- Fancymonger
- Bellygod
- Badger-legged
- Blobber
- Kissingcrust
- Maffle