Words at Play : 12 Oversized Words
Prev

#1: Knickknackatory

Definition:

: a repository or collection of knickknacks

Example:

"For my part, I keep a Nicknackatory or Toy-shop, as I formerly did over against the Exchange, and turn a sweet penny by it." — Thomas Brown, Letters from the Dead to the Living, 1702

About the Word:

You may think of your aged relative's cluttered apartment, festooned and laden with tchotchkes and chipped ephemera, as nothing more than a mess, but they may think of it proudly as a knickknackatory. The word, which has been in use since the beginning of the 18th century, was fashioned by tacking the suffix -atory (meaning 'of, belonging to, or connected with') onto the existing word knickknack, in the style of similar words, such as conservatory and laboratory. (Knickknack has long had the alternate spelling nicknack, employed in the longer word in the quote above.)

– Ammon Shea

Prev
goto slidegoto slidegoto slidegoto slidegoto slidegoto slidegoto slidegoto slidegoto slidegoto slidegoto slidegoto slide
How to use a word that (literally) drives some people nuts.
Test your vocab with our fun, fast game
Ailurophobia, and 9 other unusual fears