Klryz
Pronunciation guide: IPA symbols, stress and word endings

Vowels

iːseeɪsite / ɛbedæcat
ɑːfatherɒhot (UK)ɔːlawʊput
uːtooʌcupɜːbirdəabout
eɪdayaɪmyɔɪboyaʊnow
əʊ / oʊgo (UK / US)ɪəneareəhairʊətour

Consonants that look unusual

θthinðthisʃsheʒmeasure
tʃchurchdʒjudgeŋsingjyes

p b t d k g f v s z h m n l r w sound as in ordinary English spelling.

Marks

  • ˈ main stress, before the stressed syllable: /ˈwɔːtə/ water · ˌ lighter (secondary) stress: /ˌʌndəˈstænd/ understand
  • ː a long vowel · (r) an r said only in accents that pronounce it (most American, Scottish, Irish)

Common word endings

  • -s / -es (plurals; he/she form of verbs): /s/ after voiceless sounds (cats), /z/ after voiced (dogs), /ɪz/ after s, z, sh, ch, j sounds (buses, watches). Spelling: -es after s, x, z, ch, sh; consonant + y → -ies (city → cities).
  • -ed (past): /t/ after voiceless sounds (walked), /d/ after voiced (played), /ɪd/ after t or d (wanted). Spelling: love → loved, stop → stopped, carry → carried.
  • -ing: make → making, run → running, see → seeing.
  • Irregular: go, went, gone · be, was, been · see, saw, seen · man → men · child → children · mouse → mice.
  • Older (King James) forms: -eth = -s (he loveth = he loves) · -est with “thou” (thou lovest) · spake = spoke.

English Dictionary · 107,383 entries · Sources & licences

flyspeck

noun, verb

Forms flyspecks flyspecking flyspecked

  1. noun Housefly excrement, visible as a minuscule black dot. “The wall of the kitchen above the fruitbowl was dotted with flyspeck.”
  2. noun (by extension) Anything tiny or insignificant. “From the foothills below, Jean, Jan, and James were mere flyspecks, easily lost among the straggly pines that formed the treeline.”
  3. verb To bespeckle with tiny spatters of color.
  4. verb To inspect in minute detail to ensure that something contains no flaws; nitpick.

Synonyms

atom whiff ace thought atomy aught bissel continental bit crumb glimpse dab damn dash diddly glint dot spatter drop dusting bantam diminutive lilliputian midget petite tiny

Etymology

From fly + speck.

Webster’s 1913

  1. noun A speck or stain made by the excrement of a fly; hence, any insignificant dot.
  2. verb To soil with flyspecks.

Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “flyspeck”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details