sesquipedality

Other forms: sesquipedalities

Sesquipedality is the habit or style of using extremely long, fancy words. Your English teacher might return the rough draft of your paper covered with red marks and a request to tone down the sesquipedality.

You couldn't ask for a longer, fancier, or more complicated word than sesquipedality to describe the use of long, fancy, complicated words. This formal noun comes from the slightly more common adjective sesquipedalian, "long, long-winded, or having many syllables," which was itself originally a noun meaning "something measuring a foot and a half long." The Latin root is sesquipedalia verba, "words a foot and a half long."

Definitions of sesquipedality

1. noun

   using long words
   type of:

   expressive style, style

   a way of expressing something (in language or art or music etc.) that is characteristic of a particular person or group of people or period