Strangest Words for Things You See Every Day

Picture the lint in your pocket, a dab of toothpaste, or the space between your eyebrows. While it’s easy to express those familiar concepts in a few words, finding a single word is more challenging. But rest assured, there are terms for all of those things, as well as many other everyday objects that seem to lack common verbiage. Here’s a look at 10 weird words for ordinary things.

In the 1958 children’s book Ounce, Dice, Trice, Scottish poet Alastair Reid came up with the word “gnurr” — a term for the fuzzy lint that accumulates in the corner of a pocket or inside one’s trouser cuffs. The purpose of Reid’s book was to celebrate the playfulness of language, which he accomplished, in part, by coining this colloquial term. Reid added that “gnurr” is a smaller variety of “oosse” (“the airy furry stuff that ultimately gathers under beds”).

You may know the # symbol as a hashtag or pound sign. But there’s a different term for this little mark: “octothorpe.” The word is broken down into two parts: The “octo-” prefix comes from the eight visible points on the # symbol, but the origins of the “-thorpe” suffix are less clear, as it’s not related to any common Latin or Greek elements. One theory appears in the Merriam-Webster New Book of Word Histories (1991). The claim is that “octothorpe” was coined as a bit of a lark by telephone engineers, and that the suffix is akin to the sound of someone burping, without much etymological reasoning beyond that.

The Turkish word zarf translates to “envelope,” though it also historically refers to a device made for holding ornamental coffee cups during the Ottoman Empire. Many years later in the 1990s, an Oregonian named Jay Sorensen created a paper sleeve for holding hot cups of coffee. The sleeve came to be known as a zarf, drawing inspiration from the ornate metal coffee cup holders that long preceded it.

The word “glabella” is defined as “the smooth prominence between the eyebrows.” It’s been in use since 1823, coming from the Latin glaber, meaning “hairless” or “smooth.” The “-ella” suffix signifies its diminutive size, as the space between one’s eyebrows is often relatively small.

The term “nurdle” is defined by Merriam-Webster as “a plastic pellet that is usually less than 0.2 inch in diameter or length.” But when it comes to dental hygiene, it also refers to the little blob of toothpaste on a toothbrush. In this context, however, its origins are unclear. Some say it’s a spelling variant of “nodule,” which can refer to a small rounded lump. It was used for dabs of toothpaste by 1968, when “nurdle” began appearing in advertisements for Vote toothpaste: “One nurdle of Vote on your toothbrush is strong enough to kill the dragon and clean and brighten your pretty little teeth.”

The wooden strip that separates two panes of glass is a muntin. This comes from the French monter, which is a verb meaning “to rise.” The first known use of the term dates back to 1774, though it remains a common design style all these years later.

If you’ve ever tried to read a child’s or doctor’s sloppy handwriting, you’ve probably had a hard time deciphering the griffonage. The term “griffonage” is defined as “careless handwriting” or “a crude or illegible scrawl.” It’s derived from the Middle French term grifouner, meaning “to scribble,” which itself comes from griffon, meaning “stylus” — a type of writing implement.

The word “tittle” may raise some eyebrows, but in the world of linguistics, it means “a point or small sign used as a diacritical mark in writing.” In layman’s terms, it refers to the dot above a lowercase “i” or “j.” This word is derived from the Latin titulus, which was once widely used in reference to strokes appearing above abridged words in order to indicate missing letters.

If you look at one of your fingernails, you’ll likely see a crescent-shaped, whitish portion at the base. That mark is a lunula, which is a Latin word that means “little moon.”

Look at your shoelaces — that tiny covering at the very end of each lace is an aglet, defined as “the plain or ornamental tag covering the ends of a lace or point.” The word comes from the Middle French aguillette, which is a diminutive of arguille, meaning “needle, pin.” The next time you lace up a pair of sneakers, think of threading a needle.