Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.

Frivolous

Definition: Frivolous

Frivolous

Adjective

1. Not serious in content or attitude or behavior; "a frivolous novel"; "a frivolous remark"; "a frivolous young woman".

Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
 

Date "frivolous" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1321. (references)

Etymology: Frivolous \Friv"o*lous\, adjective. [Latin expression frivolus; probably akin to friare to rub, crumble, English friable: compare to the French expression frivole.]. (Websters 1913)


Synonyms: Frivolous

Synonyms: slight, trivial, worthless. (additional references)
Antonym: serious (adj). (additional references)

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Synonyms within Context: Frivolous

ContextSynonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus).

Caprice

Adjective: capricious; erratic, eccentric, fitful, hysterical; full of whims; Noun: maggoty; inconsistent, fanciful, fantastic, whimsical, crotchety, kinky, particular, humorsome, freakish, skittish, wanton, wayward; contrary; captious; arbitrary; unconformable; penny wise and pound foolish; fickle; (irresolute); frivolous, sleeveless, giddy, volatile.

Imbecility Folly

Foolish, unwise, injudicious, improper, unreasonable, without reason, ridiculous, absurd, idiotic, silly, stupid, asinine; ill-imagined, ill-advised, ill-judged, ill-devised; mal entendu; inconsistent, irrational, unphilosophical; extravagant; (nonsensical); sleeveless, idle; pointless, useless; inexpedient; frivolous; (trivial).

Reasoning,

Foolish; (imbecile); frivolous, pettifogging, quibbling; finespun, overrefined.

Unimportance

Trifling, trivial; slight, slender, light, flimsy, frothy, idle; puerile; (foolish); airy, shallow; weak; powerless; frivolous, petty, niggling; piddling, peddling; fribble, inane, ridiculous, farcical; finical, finikin; fiddle-faddle, fingle-fangle, namby-pamby, wishy-washy, milk and water.

Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus.

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Crosswords: Frivolous

English words defined with "frivolous": badinageCavillation, Chaffingdilettante, dilettanteish, dilettantishExsufflicateFeather-brained/, Feather-head, Feather-headed, Feather-pated, flighty, flyaway, Fribble, Fribbling, Frible, frivolity, frivolously, frivolousnessIn idlelightheadedness, lightsomenessOverlightpettiness, Petty officersilly season, slightnesstrivialityUnideaedvanity fair. (references)
Specialty definitions using "frivolous": Clelia, Companiondeboursification, DogsGad-aboutHair-dresser, Holy Communion, HorseParrot, Password, Physician, PoultrySailorTenpins, Tops. (references)
Etymologies containing "frivolous": ExsufflicateFeather-head, Feather-headed, Feather-pated. (references)

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Modern Usage: Frivolous

DomainUsage

Screenplays

We try to keep frivolous lawsuits to a minimum, unless, of course, the customer is at fault. (The Good Girl; writing credit: Mike White)

Movie/TV Titles

The Secretary of Frivolous Affairs (1915)

Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.

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Commercial Usage: Frivolous

DomainTitle

Books

  • DisOrder in the Court, Funny, Frivolous, & Outrageous Lawsuits (reference)

  • Frivolous Cowboy Poetry: "These Here Stories Are All True (Mostly)" (reference)

  • Frivolous Cupid [DOWNLOAD: ADOBE READER] (reference)

  • Frivolous Lawsuits and Frivolous Defenses: Unjustifiable Litigation (reference)

  • Frivolous Pretence (A Zebra Regency Romance) (reference)

    (more book examples)

  

Music

Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.

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Sounds Captioned with "Frivolous".

PlayCaption
Spit; joke; childish; childlike; foolish; frivolous; infantile; infantine; juvenile; kid stuff; naive; pedomorphic; petty; prekindergarten; puerile; silly; unsophisticated; young; youthful; immature.
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.

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Familiar Quotations: Frivolous

AuthorQuotation

Iris Murdoch

No love is entirely without worth, even when the frivolous calls to the frivolous and the base to the base.

Leo J. Muir

The vulgar story is Sin's frivolous comedy. For those whom this vile amusement enthralls he later stages his sad and dismal tragedies.

Marcus Valerius Martial

Why do strong arms fatigue themselves with frivolous dumbbells? To dig a vineyard is worthier exercise for men.

Marguerite Duras

It's only women who are not really quite women at all, frivolous women who have no idea, who neglect repairs.

Seneca

When an author is too meticulous about his style, you may presume that his mind is frivolous and his content flimsy.

Source: compiled by the editor from various references.

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Use in Literature: Frivolous

TitleAuthorQuote

Les Miserables

Hugo, Victor

He was of the eighteenth century, frivolous and great.

Source: compiled by the editor from various references.

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Non-Fiction Usage: Frivolous

SubjectTopicQuote

Civil Liberties

Sri Lanka

Journalists viewed these cases as frivolous and intended only to intimidate and harass the media. (references)

Russia

Keston reported on May 11 that since the regional government lost a related case in the Supreme Court, the Muslim community has been subjected to financial investigations, which the community claims are frivolous. (references)

Russia

For example, the office of the Procurator General has harassed Krishna believers with a series of frivolous investigations, including examining literature in order to make an expert opinion of whether the beliefs are harmful to society. (references)

Economic History

Eq. Guinea

Under the current judicial system, it is difficult to enforce contract rights, protect property rights or defend oneself against frivolous lawsuits. (references)

Taiwan

And while there is certainly some movement in the right direction, the GPL is proving to be a disappointment: contract terms and conditions are still often extremely one-sided; local companies sometimes make frivolous complaints under the GPL in order to be given a piece of the action; and the authorities have not yet organized a binding arbitration mechanism for government procurement disputes. (references)

Thailand

Amendments to the Civil Procedure Code on Execution of Judgements entered into force in May 1999 and limit appeal options available to debtors in an effort to quicken the foreclosure process . Under the old law, debtors were free to appeal each action taken with respect to the execution of a bankruptcy judgement . Such appeals, often frivolous in nature, were one of the tactics debtors used to delay the foreclosure process. (references)

Human Rights

Guatemala

Courts sometimes took months to resolve even patently frivolous appeals. (references)

Tonga

The police, in cooperation with government prosecutors, allegedly use repeated postponement of court dates and the filing of frivolous charges as a means to intimidate government critics. (references)

Worker Rights

Guatemala

The labor courts do not dismiss frivolous appeals, nor are their decisions enforced. (references)

Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits.

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Usage Frequency: Frivolous

"Frivolous" is generally used as an adjective (general or positive) -- approximately 99.10% of the time. "Frivolous" is used about 222 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted)
Parts of SpeechPercentUsage per
100 Million Words
Rank in English
Adjective (general or positive)99.1%22020,356
Noun (proper)0.9%2245,945
                    Total100.00%222N/A

Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.

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Expressions: Frivolous

Hyphenated Usage

Beginning with "frivolous": frivolous-looking, frivolous-menacing.

Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.

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Frequency of Internet Keywords: Frivolous

The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com.
 
ExpressionFrequency
per Day

frivolous lawsuit

85

frivolous

8

frivolous lola

7

authority frivolous irs penalties position possibility reasonable return substantial

4

frivolous law suit

4

frivolous lawsuit prevention

2

complaint criminal defendant filing frivolous heard issue malicious merit merit prosecution request tort without

2

define frivolous

2
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.

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Modern Translation: Frivolous

Language Translations for "frivolous"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses.

Albanian

  

mendjelehtë (airily, facile, featherbrain, featherbrained, featherheaded, giddy, harebrained, hoity toity, light minded, light-headed, lightsome, unreflecting, unthinking, vain), i pavlerë (bad, barren, base, catchpenny, chaffy, cheap, crummy, dud, expendable, fiddling, footling, futile, jejune, measly, nugatory, paltry, peddling, tawdry, threepenny, trashy, vain, valueless, worthless). (various references)

   

Arabic 

  

‏لعوب (coltish, dallying, frisky, playful, prankish, skittish, sportive, wanton), ‏تافه (banal, commonplace, contemptible, crummy, fade, fiddling, flat, foolish, footling, fractional, frothy, good for nothing, inane, inconsiderable, insignificant, junk, light, lilliputian, little, lowbrow, measly, minute, naught, negligible, niggling, nonsensical, nugatory, null, paltry, pedestrian, petty, piddling, pimping, piteous, pitiable, platitudinous, pointless, puny, ridiculous, run of the mill, silly, slight, slim, small time, smelly, stupid, trifle, trifling, trite, trivial, trumpery, two a penny, two bit, twopenny-halfpenny, unimportant, unsavory, unsavoury, unworthy, vain, valueless, vapid, vile, worthless), ‏عابث (frolicsome, pixie, pixy, sporty, trifling), ‏طائش (bad, careless, flighty, foolhardy, giddy, harebrained, hasty, heedless, impetuous, imprudent, inadvertent, inconsiderate, indiscreet, injudicious, libertine, light, light minded, light-headed, lunatic, mad, madcap, muddle-headed, popinjay, random, rash, rattle-brained, reckless, scatter-brain, scatter-brained, scatty, stray, stunned, thoughtless, unadvised, unwise). (various references)

   

Bulgarian 

  

незначителен (cheap, dinky, fiddling, fractional, immaterial, imperceptible, inappreciable, inconsiderable, inessential, inglorious, insignificant, least, little, mean, minor, minute, negligible, niggling, nominal, noteless, nugatory, obscure, one horse, outside, paltry, peddling, pettifogging, petty, picayune, piddling, piffling, pimping, pokey, poky, poor, potty, puerile, pygmy, rabbity, scrubby, slight, small, small time, subfusc, tenuous, third class, tiddly, trifling, trivial, two-by-four, twopenny-halfpenny, unconsidered, unimportant), лекомислен (airy, airy fairy, dizzy, empty headed, fast, featherbrained, flip, flippant, foolish, giddy, harebrained, harum scarum, idle, inconstant, light, light minded, light-headed, scatter-brained, superficial, trivial, unreflecting, unthinking). (various references)

   

Chinese 

  

轻佻 (Frivolities, frivolity), (belittle, despise, meagre, mean, peppermint, slight, small, thin, to approach, to go near, ungenerous, unkind), , (rude), (ingenious). (various references)

   

Czech

  

triviální (banal, piddling, platitudinous, trifling, trivial), povrchní (airy, casual, cheap, desultory, dollish, facile, lip-deep, perfunctory, scrappy, shallow, sketchy, skin deep, superficial), lehkovážný (easygoing, happy go lucky), lehkomyslný (airy, featherbrained, featherheaded, heedless, light minded, reckless). (various references)

   

Danish

  

forfængelig (conceited, vain). (various references)

   

Dutch

  

wuft (airy-fairy), lichtzinnig (airy-fairy), frivool. (various references)

   

Esperanto

  

frivola, vanta (conceited, vain). (various references)

   

Faeroese

  

fáfongdur (conceited, vain), lítilsverdur (conceited, vain), erpin (conceited, vain). (various references)

   

Finnish

  

kevytmielinen (fast, loose, wanton), kevytkenkäinen (fast, loose, wanton). (various references)

   

French

  

frivole, vaniteux. (various references)

   

German

  

frivol (flippant, irresponsible, risque, suggestive, trifling), leichtfertig (easygoing, flippant, flippantly, frivolously, giddily, giddy, light minded, light-headed, thoughtless), leichtsinnig (careless, carelessly, flippant, flippantly, foolish, giddily, heedless, improvident, lightheaded, reckless, thoughtless). (various references)

   

Greek 

  

κούφοσ, επιπόλαιοσ (cursory, flighty, flippant, perfunctory, sciolistic, shallow, skin deep, superficial, thoughtless), ελαφρόσ (buoyant, feathery, flippant, gentle, light, lightsome, resilient, skin deep, slight, yeasty), ελαφρόμυαλοσ (featherbrain, hare-brained, harum scarum, light-headed, scatterbrained). (various references)

   

Hebrew 

  

קל "עת (featherbrain, fickle, flighty, flippant, light minded, lightheaded), קל ראש, "תולי (comic, comical, facetious, humorous, mocking). (various references)

   

Hungarian

  

frivol (corky, lascivious, volatile), léha (dissolute, flighty, lewd, light, loose fish, raffish, ribald, vacuous), komolytalan (airy, flippant, light minded, not serious). (various references)

   

Italian

  

vanitoso (conceited, vain), frivolo (flimsy, flippant, light minded, nugatory, shallow, trifling). (various references)

   

Japanese Kanji 

  

浮薄 (caprice, cold-heartedness, fickle, insincere), ' (futile, gang, party, set, transient, vain). (various references)

   

Japanese Katakana 

  

しりがる (agility, fickleness, of loose morals), うわっちょうし (flippant, shallow), ふはく (caprice, cold-heartedness, fickle, insincere), かるがるしい (careless, indiscreet, thoughtless), あさはか (thoughtless), (enemy, enmity, evil, feud, foe, futile, grudge, harm, invasion, revenge, ruin, transient, vain), けいふ (fickle, genealogy, pedigree, second husband, stepfather), けいはく (superficial, Yours sincerely), へらへら , へ"ぺ"たる (fluttering), へ"ぽ"たる (fluttering). (various references)

   

Korean 

  

경망한. (various references)

   

Manx

  

frittagh (banal, bird-witted, brainless, inconstant, trifling), fardailagh (empty, empty of words, fruitless, futile, trifling, trivial, unavailing, vain, vain of hope). (various references)

   

Norwegian

  

fjollete, betydningsløs. (various references)

   

Pig Latin

  

ivolousfray

   

Portuguese

  

frívolo (baubling, conceited, Cork, Corky, flinch, footman, futile, giddy, impulsive, light, light-headed, lightweight, nugatory, rattle-brained, shallow, trifling, vain), fútil (conceited, coxcombical, feckless, frivolity, frothy, futile, nugatory, peddling, piddling, silliness, slight, trifling, vain). (various references)

   

Romanian

  

frivol (Corky, fast, feather-brained, flimsy, flippant, frail, giddy, shallow, unbecoming). (various references)

   

Russian 

  

фривольный (gossamer), пустой (addle, barren, blank, chaffy, do-nothing, empty, feather-brained, feckless, fiddling, foppish, frothy, gassy, gossipy, hollow, light, light-headed, null, sunken, vacant, vacuous, vapid). (various references)

   

Scottish

  

peileasach. (various references)

   

Serbo-Croatian

  

frivolan (lightsome, skittish), neozbiljan (serious: not serious), lakomislen (devil may care, featherbrain, featherbrained, flippant, improvident, inconsiderate, light minded, light-headed, thoughtless). (various references)

   

Spanish

  

hueco (airy-fairy, alcove, cave, cavity, chimerical, concave, conceited, empty, fantastic, gap, hole, hollow, of fantasy, pocket, recess, vain, void, well), frívolo (airy, flighty, fribble, giddy, skittish, trifling, trivial, trumpery). (various references)

   

Swedish

  

obetydlig (baubling, dinky, fiddling, footling, fractional, fractionary, futile, inappreciable, inconsequent, inconsequential, inconsiderable, insignificant, little, low, lowly, mean, minute, negligible, nobody, nugatory, one horse, peddling, picayune, piddling, slight, tenuous, trivial), lättsinnig (fickle, giddy, irresponsible, light, light minded, light-headed, lightsome, naughty, sporty, thoghtless, trifling, wanton). (various references)

   

Turkish

  

fingirdek (coquettish, flirtatious, kittenish, light, ludic), uçarı (abandoned, debauchee, dissolute, fast, flighty, flippant, giddy, rake, rip), hoppa (flighty, flippant, flyaway, fop, gay, giddy, hoity toity, perky, skittish, trifling), hafif (airy, blancmange, cushy, digestible, distant, dulcet, easy of digestion, feeble, feint, frail, lenient, light, lightly, lightweight, loose, mild, piano, slight, small, soft, subdued, tenuous, unsound, unsubstantial, weak, wishy washy), boş (airy, barren, blank, bootless, captious, chimerical, desert, disengaged, empty, expressionless, fallacious, flat, for hire, free, frothy, futile, gaseous, hollow, idle, inane, ineffective, ineffectual, invalid, leisure, meaningless, nugatory, null, pointless, puerile, punk, purposeless, spare, tenantless, thin, trumpery, unbuilt, unbuilt-on, unengaged, unfounded, unoccupied, unprofitable, unrecorded, unwritten-on, vacant, vacuous, vain, void, waste, windy, wishywashy, without any foundation, without foundation, yeasty), anlamsız (absurd, barren, blank, dead pan, empty, expressionless, for the birds, grotesque, inane, incoherent, inept, inexpressive, insane, insignificant, meaningless, nonsense, nonsensical, of no significance, pointless, purposeless, ridiculous, senseless, sodden, unmeaning, unreasonable, vacuous, vain, yeasty), adaleti yanıltıcı. (various references)

   

Turkmen 

  

kelpeс (flighty). (various references)

   

Ukrainian

  

фривольний (fribble, gossamer), легковажний (airy, careless, daft, featherbrained, flighty, giddy, gossipy, harum scarum, hoity toity, light-headed, lightsome, puerile, volatile), поверховий (cursory, facile, lip-deep, overly, perfunctory, shallow, sketchy, skin deep, superficial). (various references)

   

Vietnamese 

  

phù phiếm (frothy, giddy), nhẹ dạ (credulous, ill-advised, light), nhỏ mọn; vô tích sự, bông lông không đáng kể. (various references)

   

Welsh

  

gwamal (fickle), gwacsaw (giddy, trivial). (various references)

Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references.

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Ancestral Language Translations: Frivolous

LanguagePeriodTranslations
Latin500 BCE-Modern

delicata, delicatae, delicate, delicati, delicatum, delicatus, frivolus, procaci, procacissimam, procaciter, procax. (various references)

Source: compiled by the editor from various references.

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Derivations & Misspellings: Frivolous

Derivations

Words beginning with "frivolous": frivolously, frivolousness, frivolousnesses. (additional references)

Words ending with "frivolous": nonfrivolous, unfrivolous. (additional references)


Misspellings

"Frivolous" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: fivolous, frivalous, frivelous, frivilous, frivolos, frivolovs, frivolus, frivoulous, frivulous, frovolous, fruvolous, frvolous. (additional references)

Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references).

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Rhyming with "Frivolous"

# of Phoneme MatchesPronunciationWord(s) rhyming with "frivolous" (pronounced fri"vulus)
5-v u l u smarvelous.
4-u l u sacropolis, anomalous, calculus, Carolus, fabulous, garrulous, incredulous, libelous, megalopolis, merciless, meticulous, metropolis, miraculous, nautilus, nebulous, necropolis, Oxalis, pendulous, perilous, populace, populous, querulous, ridiculous, scandalous, scrupulous, scurrilous, stimulus, syphilis, tantalus, tremulous, unscrupulous.
3-l u saccomplice, ageless, aimless, airless, Amaryllis, atlas, bacillus, backless, balas, baseless, blameless, bloodless, bolus, boneless, bottomless, boundless, brainless, breathless, callous, callus, careless, cashless, ceaseless, childless, classless, cloudless, clueless, Colas, colorless, cordless, countless, cutlass, defenseless, digitalis, directionless, doubtless, driverless, ductless, earless, effortless, endless, expressionless, eyeless, faceless, fatherless, fearless, featherless, featureless, feckless, fellas, fenceless, flawless, flightless, frictionless, fruitless, Gallus, gladiolus, godless, graceless, groundless, guileless, guiltless, hairless, hapless, harmless, headless, heartless, helpless, homeless, hopeless, hornless, humorless, irregardless, issueless, jealous, jobless, keyless, lactobacillus, landless, lawless, leaderless, leafless, legless, lifeless, limbless, limitless, listless, loveless, luckless, malice, meaningless, meatless, mindless, motherless, motionless, nameless, necklace, needless, odorless, overzealous, painless, palace, paperless, peerless, penniless, pilotless, pitiless, pointless, polis, powerless, priceless, prothallus, purposeless, reckless, regardless, relentless, remorseless, restless, riskless, rootless, rudderless, ruthless, scoreless, seamless, selfless, senseless, sexless, shameless, shapeless, shiftless, skinless, sleepless, sleeveless, smokeless, solace, soulless, speechless, spineless, spotless, stainless, stateless, stylus, surplus, tasteless, thankless, thoughtless, ticketless, tieless, timeless, tireless, toothless, topless, treeless, trellis, useless, valueless, victimless, voiceless, warrantless, weightless, windlass, windowless, wireless, witless, wordless, worthless, zealous, zipless.

Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits.

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Anagrams: Frivolous

Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams

Words within the letters "f-i-l-o-o-r-s-u-v"

-2 letters: folious, frivols, furioso.

-3 letters: floors, flours, fluors, folios, frivol.

-4 letters: filos, floor, flour, fluor, foils, folio, fools, fouls, fours, furls, fusil, loofs, loris, louis, lours, olios, ovoli, roils, rolfs, roofs, sulfo, viols, virls, virus, visor.

-5 letters: filo, fils, firs, flus, foil, fool, foul, four, furl, furs, loof, loos, lour, luvs, oils, olio, ours, rifs.

 Words containing the letters "f-i-l-o-o-r-s-u-v"
 

+2 letters: frivolously, unfrivolous.

 

+3 letters: nonfrivolous, vociferously.

 

+4 letters: frivolousness.

Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.

SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro.

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Alternative Orthography: Frivolous


Hexadecimal (or equivalents, 770AD-1900s) (references)

46 72 69 76 6F 6C 6F 75 73

Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519; backwards) (references)

American Sign Language (origins from 1620-1817 in Italy and, especially, France) (references)

=

Semaphore (1791, in France) (references)

Braille (1829, in France) (references)

Morse Code (1836) (references)

..-.    .-.    ..    ...-    ---    .-..    ---    ..-    ...

Dancing Men (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, 1903) (references)

Binary Code (1918-1938, probably earlier) (references)

01000110 01110010 01101001 01110110 01101111 01101100 01101111 01110101 01110011

HTML Code (1990) (references)

&#70 &#114 &#105 &#118 &#111 &#108 &#111 &#117 &#115

ISO 10646 (1991-1993) (references)

0046 0072 0069 0076 006F 006C 006F 0075 0073

British Sign Language (Fingerspelling, BSL; 1992, British Deaf Association Dictionary of British Sign Language) (references)

Encryption (beginner's substitution cypher): (references)

408475888178818785

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INDEX

1. Definition
2. Synonyms
3. Crosswords
4. Usage: Modern
5. Usage: Commercial
6. Sounds
7. Quotations: Familiar
8. Quotations: Fiction
9. Quotations: Non-fiction
10. Usage Frequency
11. Expressions
12. Expressions: Internet
13. Translations: Modern
14. Translations: Ancient
15. Derivations
16. Rhymes
17. Anagrams
18. Orthography
19. Bibliography


  

Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.