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

spinster

UK /ˈspɪnstə/ · US /ˈspɪnstɚ/ noun

Forms spinsters

  1. noun (sometimes derogatory) A woman who has never been married, especially one past the typical marrying age according to social traditions.
  2. noun One who spins (puts a spin on) a political media story so as to give something a favorable or advantageous appearance; a spin doctor, spin merchant or spinmeister.
  3. noun (obsolete) Someone whose occupation was spinning thread.
  4. noun (obsolete) A woman of evil life and character; so called from being forced to spin in a house of correction.
  5. noun (rare, dialectal) A spider; an insect (such as a silkworm) which spins thread.

Synonyms

old maid spinner thread maker

Etymology

From Middle English spynnestere (“woman who spins fibre”), from c. 1350; equivalent to spin + -ster. The semantic development is from a historical notion of unmarried women spinning thread for a living.

Webster’s 1913

  1. noun A woman who spins, or whose occupation is to spin.
  2. noun A man who spins. [Obs.] Shak.

Etymology [Spin + -ster.]

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