◆ Lexicon
A working lexicon of West Germanic memory.
A curated record of words attested in elder voices across Dutch, Afrikaans, German, English, and West Frisian. Some are genuinely vanishing — words a 75-year-old uses naturally that a 25-year-old has to ask about. Others are alive but illuminating: words that travel between languages, words with no clean equivalent, words that have quietly displaced their predecessors.
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boer
/buːr/
noun
Farmer, peasant; (historical, capitalised) Afrikaner settler of Dutch descent in South Africa; (South African...
politically loaded
NL
AF
EN
dorp
/dɔrp/
noun
Village, small town; (South African English) a small provincial town, often implying backwardness or insularity.
cross cultural
NL
AF
EN
lekker
/ˈlɛkər/
adjective
Tasty, delicious; pleasant, nice, enjoyable; (South African English loan) good, great.
cross cultural
NL
AF
EN
mardy
/ˈmɑː.di/
adjective
Spoilt, sulky, whining, easily upset; (of a child) soft, pampered. East Midlands and Yorkshire dialect. Widely...
regional
EN
mither
/ˈmɪð.ə/
verb
To bother, pester, nag, fuss; to make an unnecessary nuisance of oneself; (intransitive) to moan, ramble, or talk...
regional
EN
nesh
/nɛʃ/
adjective
Unusually sensitive to cold; soft, weak, tender; (of food) soft or succulent. Northern England dialect (Yorkshire,...
regional
EN
stil / still / stille
/stɪl/
adjective
Still, quiet, silent; motionless; (as adverb) without sound or movement. Shared across English, Dutch, German,...
vanishing
NL
AF
DE
EN
FY
7 entries