I must confess I never heard this word before either written or spoken. Have you?
QUOTE |
A survey of more than 2,000 Britons has revealed "nincompoop" is the nation's favorite word out of the 16,500 entries in the Cambridge Dictionary. The survey found 13 percent of respondents chose "nincompoop" - believed to be derived from the Latin "non compos mentis," meaning not of sound mind - as their favorite sounding English word, The Daily Mai reported. The poll was commissioned by Ubisoft, makers of the language computer game My Word Search. The second most popular word was "love" and the third was "mum". "The results demonstrate our passion for language and the sentiment we attach to words such as love and mum," Ubisoft spokesman Mike Masuku said. "It also highlights how narrow most people's vocabulary has become." |
What a funny sounding word, I cannot imagine that with a British accent, wait, actually I can.
Nincompoop is a slang for idiot. Yes I have heard this word used mainly by Americans though. I am surprised that this word is considered a favourite for the Brits. I would have thought words like "Blimey" or "mate" would be more popular with the Brits.