Honorificabilitudinitatibus facts for kids
_-_page_47_-_honorificabilitudinitatibus.jpg)
Honorificabilitudinitatibus is a very long Latin word that means "the state of being able to achieve honors." It's famous because it appears in William Shakespeare's play Love's Labour's Lost. This word is special because it's the only time Shakespeare used it in his plays. It's also the longest word in English that strictly switches between consonants and vowels.
Contents
Why Shakespeare Used This Long Word
In Shakespeare's play Love's Labour's Lost, the funny character Costard says this word. He uses it after two very educated but silly characters, Holofernes and Sir Nathaniel, have a long, fancy conversation. They use a mix of Latin and complicated English words. Costard then jokes about how long and difficult their words are, saying:
O, they have lived long on the alms-basket of words, I marvel thy master hath not eaten thee for a word; for thou art not so long by the head as honorificabilitudinitatibus: thou art easier swallowed than a flap-dragon.
Basically, Costard is saying that the word is so long, it's like a giant mouthful!
Secret Codes and Anagrams
Some people who believe that Francis Bacon (not Shakespeare) wrote Shakespeare's plays have used this word as a clue. They thought it might be a secret code or a hidden message. In 1905, a man named Isaac Hull Platt suggested that the word was an anagram. An anagram is when you rearrange the letters of a word or phrase to make a new one. Platt thought the letters of honorificabilitudinitatibus could be rearranged to form a Latin phrase: hi ludi, F. Baconis nati, tuiti orbi. This means "these plays, F. Bacon's offspring, are preserved for the world." This idea became quite popular for a while.
However, many other people have shown that you can make lots of different anagrams from the word. For example, someone rearranged the letters to praise the Italian poet Dante. Another person even "proved" that Shakespeare's plays were written by Ben Jonson using an anagram! These examples show that just because you can make an anagram, it doesn't mean it's a real secret message.
History of a Very Long Word
Even before Shakespeare, this super long word and its similar forms were used by writers and scholars in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.
Medieval Times
- Early Use: The word was known as far back as the 8th century by a Latin teacher named Peter of Pisa.
- Dictionaries: An Italian dictionary writer named Papias used it around 1055. Later, in 1286, another Italian grammarian, Johannes Balbus, included the full word in his very popular Latin dictionary called Catholicon. This dictionary was one of the first books ever printed using Gutenberg's printing press in 1460!
- Too Long for Poems: Around 1302, the famous Italian poet Dante mentioned honorificabilitudinitate as an example of a word that was too long to fit nicely into a standard line of poetry.
- Official Records: The word even appeared in an official English government record during the time of King Henry VI (1422–1461).
- School Jokes: The word was part of a funny poem about a man who loved using really long words. This poem was a popular joke among schoolboys during the time of Erasmus, a famous Dutch scholar, and even during Shakespeare's time. It was often found in a popular textbook called Adagia.
- Scribbles and Inscriptions: Scribes (people who copied books by hand) sometimes used this word to test their pens. It has also been found carved on old objects! A small cup found at Kirby Muxloe Castle in England had honorificabilitudinitatibus written around it. A metal jug found at Ashby de la Zouch Castle had a shorter version of the word carved on it.
After Shakespeare's Time
- Other Writers: Just a year after Shakespeare's play, the English writer Thomas Nashe used the word in his writing to make fun of doctors who used fancy, hard-to-understand words. Other playwrights like John Marston and John Fletcher also used it in their plays, often to show that someone was speaking nonsense.
- English Dictionaries: In 1656, Thomas Blount included an English version of the word, honorificabilitudinity, in his dictionary, defining it as "honorableness."
- Dr. Johnson's Comment: Even the famous dictionary writer Samuel Johnson talked about the word in 1765. He said it was "the longest word known." However, an expert named Joseph Hunter later disagreed, saying it wasn't a real "word" but just a long string of syllables used for writing practice.
- Making Fun of Science: In 1858, Charles Dickens used the word in an essay to make fun of scientists who used too many long, complicated Latin words to describe simple things.
- Modern Books and TV:
* The famous writer James Joyce used the word in his huge 1922 novel Ulysses. * In 1993, U.S. News & World Report mentioned it when talking about new words being added to the game of Scrabble. * The word was featured in a 1995 episode of the cartoon Pinky and the Brain, where it was defined as "with honorablenesses." * In a 2005 episode of the TV show Ned's Declassified School Survival Guide, the character Ned Bigby has to spell "honorificabilitudinitatibus" in a spelling bee. * In Suzanne Selfors' 2011 children's book Smells Like Treasure, a spelling champion character uses the word.
See also
- Antidisestablishmentarianism
- Floccinaucinihilipilification
- Longest word in English
- Longest words
- Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis
- Pseudopseudohypoparathyroidism
- Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious
