Runcible
nonsense word created by Edward Lear
"Runcible" is a pseudoword invented by Edward Lear. The word appears (as an adjective) several times in his works, most famously as the "runcible spoon" used by the Owl and the Pussycat. The word "runcible" was apparently one of Lear's favourite inventions, appearing in several of his works in reference to a number of different objects. In his verse self-portrait, The Self-Portrait of the Laureate of Nonsense, it is noted that "he weareth a runcible hat". Other poems include mention of a "runcible cat", a "runcible goose" (in the sense of "silly person"), a "runcible wall", and "the Rural Runcible Raven".
Various things have been named "runcible" or "runcible spoon", including a computer program compiler for an early programming language, a restaurant in Bloomington, Indiana, and a food magazine published in the District of Columbia.
Origin
Edward Lear's best-known poem, The Owl and the Pussy-Cat, published in 1870, includes the passage:
Another mention of this piece of cutlery appears in Edward Lear's alphabetical illustrations Twenty-Six Nonsense Rhymes and Pictures. Its entry for 'D' reads
Lear often illustrated his own poems, and he drew a picture of the "dolomphious duck" holding in its beak a round-bowled spoon containing a frog.
Alternative origins
Lear does not appear to have had any firm idea of what the word "runcible" means. His whimsical nonsense verse celebrates words primarily for their sound, and a specific definition is not needed to appreciate his work.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Runcible” is nonsense word created by Edward Lear. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Runcible, nonsense and word, not as a finished interpretation.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jan 17, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q7379689. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1870.
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This entry incorporates text from “Runcible” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.