12-letter words containing c, w, a
- carrier wave — a wave of fixed amplitude and frequency that is modulated in amplitude, frequency, or phase in order to carry a signal in radio transmission, etc
- carrion crow — a common predatory and scavenging European crow, Corvus corone, similar to the rook but having a pure black bill
- carriwitchet — a conundrum, nonsensical question, or pun
- carry weight — to be important, influential, etc.
- carryforward — carry-over.
- cartwheeling — Present participle of cartwheel.
- cashew apple — the soft, swollen, pear-shaped stalk of the cashew tree, to which a cashew nut is attached: used in preserves and wine.
- cassel brown — Vandyke brown.
- caterwauling — the shrieking and yowling made by a cat, for example when it is on heat or fighting
- cathode glow — a luminous region between the Aston dark space and the Crookes dark space in a vacuum tube, occurring when the pressure is low.
- cauliflowers — Plural form of cauliflower.
- cave dweller — a prehistoric person; person who lives in a cave
- chair warmer — an officeholder, employee, or the like, who accomplishes little, especially a person who holds an interim position.
- chair-warmer — an officeholder, employee, or the like, who accomplishes little, especially a person who holds an interim position.
- charity work — unpaid work, usually fundraising, done in aid of a charity
- charles drew — Charles Richard, 1904–50, U.S. physician: developer of blood-bank technique.
- charles' law — the principle that all gases expand equally for the same rise of temperature if they are held at constant pressure: also that the pressures of all gases increase equally for the same rise of temperature if they are held at constant volume. The law is now known to be only true for ideal gases
- chateau wine — a wine produced from any of certain vineyards in the Bordeaux region of France
- cheese straw — a long thin cheese-flavoured strip of pastry
- chew the fat — If people chew the fat, they talk in a relaxed, informal way.
- chew the rag — to converse idly; chat
- chickasawhay — a river in SE Mississippi, flowing S to the Pascagoula River. 210 miles (338 km) long.
- chicken hawk — any of various hawks, esp. an accipiter, that prey, or are reputed to prey, on barnyard fowl
- chinese wall — a notional barrier between the parts of a business, esp between the market makers and brokers of a stock-exchange business, across which no information should pass to the detriment of clients
- chip away at — If you chip away at something such as an idea, a feeling, or a system, you gradually make it weaker or less likely to succeed by repeated efforts.
- chowderheads — Plural form of chowderhead.
- churchwarden — In the Anglican Church, a churchwarden is the person who has been chosen by a congregation to help the vicar of a parish with administration and other duties.
- cigar flower — the common name for a small, shrubby plant, Cuphea ignea, of the loosestrife family, native to Mexico and Jamaica, grown as an ornamental and houseplant: named for its red tubular flowers that resemble cigars.
- circular saw — A circular saw is a round metal disk with a sharp edge which is used for cutting wood and other materials.
- clam chowder — chowder containing clams
- claw hatchet — a hatchet with a claw at one end of its head for extracting nails
- claw setting — a jewellery setting with clawlike prongs
- clean bowled — bowled by a ball that breaks the wicket without hitting the batsman or his bat
- cochairwoman — a woman who cochairs an organization
- cock sparrow — a male sparrow
- cold warrior — a person who engages in or promotes a cold war
- come forward — If someone comes forward, they offer to do something or to give some information in response to a request for help.
- commonwealth — The Commonwealth is an organization consisting of the United Kingdom and most of the countries that were previously under its rule.
- companionway — A companionway is a staircase or ladder that leads from one deck to another on a ship.
- company town — a town built by a company for its employees
- complex wave — a waveform consisting of a fundamental frequency with superimposed harmonics
- computer law — a body of law arising out of the special conditions relating to the use of computers, as in computer crime or software copyright.
- contract law — the branch of law that deals with contracts
- contrariwise — from a contrasting point of view; on the other hand
- conway's law — (project, humour) The rule (presumably formulated by Melvin Conway) that the organisation of software and the organisation of the software team will be congruent; originally stated as "If you have four groups working on a compiler, you'll get a 4-pass compiler".
- coomaraswamy — Ananda (Kentish). 1877–1947, Ceylonese art historian and interpreter of Indian culture to the West
- core drawing — drawing of fine tubing using wire as a mandrel.
- core gateway — Historically, one of a set of gateways (routers) operated by the Internet Network Operations Center at Bolt, Beranek and Newman (BBN). The core gateway system formed a central part of Internet routing in that all groups must advertise paths to their networks from a core gateway.
- corn earworm — the larva of the noctuid moth Heliothis armigera, which feeds on maize and many other crop plants
- cornishwoman — a woman who is a native or inhabitant of Cornwall