Words and Symbols Trivia Quiz

Answer: tilde

Yes, that odd little ~ symbol has a name: tilde. It is also used in marking Spanish words.

Answer: tittle

It is generally agreed that the dot over the "i" is called a "tittle". A tittle also refers to those small markings that appear over words, as found in many Hebrew words.

Answer: set

The Oxford English Dictionary indicates "set" has well over one hundred definitions. Set can be used as a noun, a verb, and can be found in phrases.

Answer: a sentence that contains every letter of the alphabet

For those of you who took keyboarding when typewriters were used, you will undoubtedly remember the famous typing directive: "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog". This sentence uses all the letters of the alphabet, making it a pangram.

Answer: palindrome

A rebus is a piece of writing that uses pictures, numbers, or letters to make words. "Highlights for Children", the popular children's magazine, used to have a rebus in every issue, and perhaps still does.
A lipogram omits a particular letter. For instance, did you know that Edgar Allen Poe has every letter but "z" in his poem "The Raven"?
A univocalic uses only one of the vowels, as in the sentence: "Profs from Oxford show frosh who do post docs how to gloss works of Wordsworth", which comes from "Eunoia" by Christian Bok. This is a novel where each chapter is missing four of the five vowels.

Answer: True

Tis true. Poets have yet to come up with true rhymes, words that directly rhyme with these given words. Half-rhymes such as "bunch" with "month" use assonance, and are not considered true rhymes. In archaic English, however, the word "chilver" referred to a female lamb.

Answer: octothorpe

The octothorpe is usually used for indicating if a note is sharp, and in American can be used in numbering. The hyphen is mostly used to connect words, such as in syllable breaks, or creating adverbial words, like tin-plated. The asterisk, the star-shaped symbol, is a reference mark, being used to indicate the omission of letters or words, for example.

The ellipsis is a series of symbols, such as three periods or three asterisks, used to show the omission of one or more words in a passage.

Answer: mnemonic

Mnemonics are prompts to help remember information, and can range from the little ditty we dutifully memorized about Columbus to rearranging information. One handy mnemonic for remembering the eight parts of speech is: PAPA VINC (pronouns adjectives prepositions adverbs verbs interjections nouns conjunctions).

Answer: cleave

Cleave means to both adhere and to separate. I can adhere, or cleave, to my new college. I can also cleave, or separate my attachments to my old college alliances.

Answer: euphemism

"He is not available at this time" or "My dad can't come to the phone" or even "He is out at the moment, could I take a message?" are all euphemisms for when dad is in the shower but doesn't want whomever is calling to know this information.

Hyperboles are those exaggerations we tend to use a bazillion times a day--like I just did.

And idioms are words or sayings like "cat got your tongue?" The cat doesn't have my tongue, but it indicates I'm not talking very much.