manxome

English edit

Etymology edit

Coined by British author and scholar Lewis Carroll in his nonsense poem “Jabberwocky” (see quotation below).

Adjective edit

manxome (comparative more manxome, superlative most manxome)

(poetic, rare) Fearsome, monstrous.
- 1871 December 27 (indicated as 1872), Lewis Carroll [pseudonym; Charles Lutwidge Dodgson], “[Looking-Glass House.] Jabberwocky.”, in Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There, London: Macmillan and Co., →OCLC, page 22:
  He took his vorpal sword in hand: / Long time the manxome foe he sought— / So rested he by the Tumtum tree, / And stood awhile in thought.
- 1907 September 28, “The Trial of the Serpent”, in The Saturday Review of Politics, Literature, Science, and Art, volume 104, number 2709, page 389, column 1:
  Of only one adder were we ever possessed, which we kept, by collusion with a home-boarder, in a cucumber-frame at Harrow. In consideration of his providing the manxome beast with house-room (we early perceived that in our own house the adder would be unwelcome), and because we couldn't well get into his father's garden without him, we permitted him to share the fearful delight of routing our pet out with a rake (it was a retiring creature) "between Bills", and trying to make him eat frogs.
- 1987, Hugh Cook, The Wordsmiths and the Warguild (Chronicles of an Age of Darkness), Gerrards Cross, Buckinghamshire: Colin Smythe, →ISBN, page 192:
  Out from the odex came a fang-gaping ilps, a vicious manxome monster which Governor Troop demolished with five well-placed immaculately-timed questions.
- 2016, E. S. Wesley, The Outs, Curiosity Quills Press, →ISBN, page 197:
  Caleb had only fought a few manxome foes in his short life, and this, a Jabberwock. It would take the height of readiness and strength to stand a hero's chance.

References edit

“manxome, adj.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.