Jump to content
Linguaholic

Palindromes


Silverhoop

Recommended Posts

PALINDROME: a word, phrase, or number that reads the same backward or forward.

Some of my favourites are:

Noon

Madam

Eve

Racecar

Deed

Level

Rotor

Civic

Radar

Or some phrases:

"Madam, I'm Adam." (Adam's first words to Eve?)

"A man, a plan, a canal--Panama!" (The history of the Panama Canal in brief)

"Able was I ere I saw Elba." (Napoleon's lament)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Center Script Content

I love palindromes, especially the phrases.  Some of my favorites are:

Satan oscillate my metallic sonatas

Mr Owl ate my metal worm

Are we not drawn onward, we few, drawn onward to new era?

There's also the joke phobia aibohphobia, the fear of palindromes.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Those are some good ones!  Since this is a language forum, even if this is the English area, I figure it won't hurt too much to share some from other languages too.  One of those that I like is:

Engage le jeu que je le gagne

It translates more or less to 'start the game so I can win'

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I always find palindromes as a very interesting topic! You could actually go on and on about these with your friends for an entire day and still find it amusing afterwards. I searched for some palindromes on the internet and found a website that listed several of them. Some of the funniest I read are:

No cab, no tuna nut on bacon.

No sir! Away! A papaya war is on.

I also discovered one that almost made it as a palindrome that seemed worthy enough to post, which is:

A Santa dog lived as a devil God at NASA.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

Oh, I haven't heard or learn of this term before. I have always wondered if there's a word for words that mean the same when they're written backwards. Now, you've found it for me. :) I have thought about some words that mean the same when they're written backwards, but I guess you've already written down the list here. Good post!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

great topic, Silverhoop.

I kinda like the following palindrome :  "Dammit, I'm mad!"

I am thinking of some palindromes in german. Might gonna add them later!

Haha! That was a good one. It's actually one of my favorites.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 5 months later...
  • 1 year later...
On ‎11‎/‎11‎/‎2013‎ ‎11‎:‎30‎:‎23‎, Mizali said:

I love palindromes, especially the phrases.  Some of my favorites are:

 

Satan oscillate my metallic sonatas

Mr Owl ate my metal worm

Are we not drawn onward, we few, drawn onward to new era?

 

 

There's also the joke phobia aibohphobia, the fear of palindromes.

I've never heard that one.  It's funny...and clever.  I caught the joke, it's subtle.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I might sound so stupid or just uninformed here but this is the first time I heard of palindromes. I mean I know there are some word that read the same forward and backward, but I did not know there was a word for them. I like it now. I mean this is just a great place for one to learn about lots of new things, not only share. I will make sure I spread this info. I feel a little bit smarter now. Thank you.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...

Are there really long palindromes in the english language? Like a few sentence or more?

In hungarian language there are several little stories consisting only of palindromes. It was s big trend among writers and poets in the 1900's to write in palindromes,

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 5 months later...

I have heard of the single word instances of this, but my mind is pretty blown away by how many sentences there actually are! I wish I were clever enough to develop some of my own! 

This is a random question I am sure, but is there a technical term for when a word creates a new word when spelled backwards? For example, how "stressed" is transformed into "desserts". 

To contribute to the palindrome list...

Rotor

Civic

Deleveled 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

As this is Linguaholic, I'll throw Malayalam out there: a palindromic language.

Yep it's cool that "stressed" backwards is "desserts". I think those are the longest pair of words in English that work like that. I've heard "semordnilap" for a word that spells another word backwards, but I doubt that's an official term.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
×
  • Create New...