What’s a Nonce Word?

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Lorelai calling from Wakefield, Virginia.

Hi, Lorelai. Welcome to the show.

We’re delighted to have you. What’s up, Lorelai?

Well, I was hoping to speak with you about nonce words, N-O-N-C-E.

It’s not even a word that I knew a month ago, but I play this game every morning with my husband over coffee called the spelling bee. It’s in the newspaper.

So you’re given seven letters and you have to come up with as many words as possible using any combination of any of those letters.

Whenever the letters N-O-C-E are in play, I always miss the word nonce, honestly, because I had never heard of it. Certainly never used it before.

So I Googled it, and I discovered that it’s an adjective, and it means coined for or used for one occasion, which I thought was hilarious because to me in my world, nonce is like a one-occasion word.

The only occasion I’d ever use it is for this puzzle.

So I was wondering if you had other examples of nonce words.

So you learned nonce from the New York Times spelling bee then, huh?

Yes, yes.

And that’s the only time you see it.

Yeah, nonce is not that common a word.

It has an interesting origin.

It comes from Middle English words that literally mean for the once, for than anes.

And as you said, it involves words that are invented on the spur of the moment just to be used on that particular occasion.

And sometimes they just, you know, float out into the ether and sometimes they stick around.

The famous words, it’s a novelty word, is frabjous, you know, that Lewis Carroll used in his poem Jabberwocky.

Yes, yes.

That’s a great one.

But there are a lot of those.

The other day somebody was asking me for a languagey book.

They wanted a recommendation for a languagey book.

And I thought, well, that’s a perfect nonce word, right?

You can’t find it in the dictionary, but a lot of times you add a Y to a word and you get something like languagey.

And you know what I mean, right, when I talk about a languagey book.

Right, right.

It struck me that nonce is a nonce word.

Like it is what it is.

Can you think of any other words that kind of are what they are?

Like I suppose, I guess portmanteau actually is a portmanteau.

Are there any words that really are what they are?

Yeah, portmanteau meaning a word that combines a couple of different words like motel from motor hotel.

Portmanteau being an old word for suitcase in French.

Right.

Well, those words are called autological words.

I mean, think of the word polysyllabic.

That word is polysyllabic or pentosyllabic.

Or monithelous, which means smooth like honey.

Right.

Flowing like honey.

Right.

Pentosyllabic.

Yeah, Grant was talking about like a mellifluous voice.

There’s also sibilant, you know, which is a sibilant word, right?

It means sort of, you know, having a hissing or whistling sound.

Oh, that’s a great one.

I thought of noun, like noun really is a noun.

Noun is a noun.

That’s a perfect example, yes.

Oh, how about we, W-E-E?

It’s a little bitty word.

Oh, right.

That’s perfect.

Yeah.

Well, thank you.

I appreciate the insight on non-swords, and hopefully having this whole conversation about this word will help it stick in my brain so the next time those letters are up, not only can I come up with that word, but also have a conversation about it and what it means and what it is.

Good luck with your pangrams.

Thank you.

I appreciate it.

All right.

Take care.

Bye-bye.

Have a good afternoon.

Thank you.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

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