Words no longer used by people

Words like charabanc, wittol, drysalter, alienism no longer used by people

London, August 22 (ANI): A new research from Collins Dictionary has indicated that words like aerodrome, charabanc, wittol, drysalter, alienism and many others are no longer used by people.

Collins Dictionary experts have compiled a list of words, which have fallen out of use and presumed to have become extinct in the past year, by tracking how often they appear.

Words like "wittol", a man who tolerates his wife's unfaithfulness, have not been used much since the 1940s.

The terms "drysalter", a dealer in certain chemical products and foods, and "alienism", the study and treatment of mental illness, have also faded from use.

Some of the vanished words are old-fashioned modes of transport such as the "cyclogiro", a type of aircraft propelled by rotating blades, and charabanc, a motor coach.

The "stauroscope", an optical instrument for studying the crystal structure of minerals under polarized light, is also no longer used.

"We track words using a very large database of language which is a very large collection of various texts from spoken and written language, including books, newspapers and magazines so we can track language change over time," the Telegraph quoted Dr Ruth O'Donovan, Asset Development Manager at Collins Language Division in Glasgow, as saying.

"We track new words but we can also track for the frequency of existing words and when they get below a certain threshold we see them as being obsolete, though they may be used in very specialist circumstances.

"Such words are in our largest dictionary but we've categorised them as obsolete, as although they go out of general use they are still of interest to historians so it's useful to have them in the dictionary. But we would exclude them from our smaller dictionaries," added O'Donovan.

Other words that have passed out of use include "supererogate" which means to do or perform more than is required.

While "succedaneum", meaning something used as a substitute also no longer trips off the modern tongue.

Neither does "woolfell" the skin of a sheep or similar animal with the fleece still attached.

The data was discovered as part of research for the publication of the next Collins English Dictionary in October 2011. (ANI)