postlinguistics

52books:

coffeehousejunkie:

scumblr:

pica:

1. Aa. And I don’t mean the acronym for Alcoholics Anonymous, either. Aa is “basaltic lava having a rough surface.”
2. Qat – a flowering plant native to East Africa and the Arabian peninsula.
3. Zax – a slater or slate mason, or the tool used to cut and punch nail holes in roofing slate.
4. Cwm – a valley, especially one created by glacial movement. Be warned: this one won’t get you many points, but it is good for using up pesky, low-score consonants taking up valuable space on your rack.
5. Xu – Vietnamese money
6. Qua – as or as being, or in the character of.
7. Suq – a market, or part of a market, in an Arab city.
8. Adz – an axe-like tool.
9. Jo – sweetheart or dear
10. Qadi – a judge in the Muslim community.

Good to know. I should probably print this out.

As you might expect, most of these are loanwords, except adz and zax, which go back to Old English. Cwm is from Welsh, and jo is from Scots (not to be confused with Scottish Gaelic).