humblebee
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 0.00 in modern English
18
Scrabble Score
9
Letters
3
Syllables
6
Unique Chars
Meaning
Example Sentences
- "The Fox, the Ape, and the Humble-Bee, Were ſtill at oddes being but three."
- "1800's, Ralph Waldo Emerson, The Humblebee Burly, dozing humblebee, Where thou art is clime for me."
- "Hence I have very little doubt, that if the whole genus of humble-bees became extinct or very rare in England, the heartsease and red clover would become very rare, or wholly disappear."
Etymology
From Middle English humbul-be, humbulbe, hombul-be, from *humbul (“bumblebee”) + be (“bee”). See also West Frisian hommel (“bumblebee”), Dutch hommel (“bumblebee”), German Low German Hummel (“bumblebee”), German Hummel (“bumblebee”), Swedish humla (“bumblebee”), Norwegian humle (“bumblebee”); also cognate with Dutch hommelbij (“bumblebee”), Danish humlebi (“bumblebee”). Compare also English humble (“to hum”).
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: humbul-be