Word Pronunciation & Dictionary

rhyme or reason

Word Rarity Rare

Frequency: Zipf frequency 3.55 in modern English

Syllables: rhyme or rea-son
IPA

21

Scrabble Score

13

Letters

2

Syllables

9

Unique Chars

Meaning

noun

Logic; common sense.

Uncountable

Example Sentences

"Prices vary considerably from one town to another with no apparent rhyme or reason."
"He would often fly into an unexpected rage without rhyme or reason."
"I could see no rhyme or reason for the referee's decision. It was baffling!"
"While many of your essays were interesting, some seemed little more than self-promotion on the part of authors. I wished there had been a central essay to anchor the others or some kind of discernable rhyme or reason to their placement. As it was, I could not help but feel that it was a mish-mash of unrelated and poorly edited information."

Etymology

Calque of Middle French n'y avoir ryme ne raison (Eustache Deschamps), attributed to the poet Edmund Spenser in a conversation with Queen Elizabeth I.

Usage

Uncountable

Inflected Forms

rhyme nor reason (alternative)

Questions

What does rhyme or reason mean?: Logic; common sense.
Where does rhyme or reason come from?: Calque of Middle French n'y avoir ryme ne raison (Eustache Deschamps), attributed to the poet Edmund Spenser in a conversation with Queen Elizabeth I.

How to pronounce rhyme or reason

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