13-letter words containing d, e, t, r, a
- apparent wind — (wind), the velocity of air as measured from a moving object, as a ship.
- archimandrite — the head of a monastery or a group of monasteries
- architectured — Designed (according to a form of architecture, or as if by an architect).
- aridity index — a number indicating how much more precipitation could be lost by evapotranspiration if it were available than is actually lost at a given location.
- armistice day — the anniversary of the signing of the armistice that ended World War I, on Nov 11, 1918, now kept on Remembrance Sunday
- armour-plated — An armour-plated vehicle or building has a hard metal covering in order to protect it from gunfire and other missiles.
- armstand dive — a dive starting from a handstand at the end of a springboard or a platform with the diver's back to the water.
- arseniuretted — combined with arsenic so as to form an arsenide.
- asteroid belt — the concentrations of asteroids that move around the sun mainly between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter
- aten asteroid — one of a small group of asteroids whose orbits cross that of the earth and whose semimajor axes are smaller than that of the earth.
- attested form — a linguistic form that can be shown to be in use or in written records
- attested herd — a herd of cattle, etc that has been certified as being free from a disease, esp from tuberculosis
- attitudinizer — One who attitudinizes, or practises poses.
- auto-destruct — self-destruct.
- autoresponder — A program that automatically generates a set response to all messages sent to a particular e-mail address.
- bacteriocidal — Alternative spelling of bactericidal.
- balanced tree — (algorithm) An optimisation of a tree which aims to keep equal numbers of items on each subtree of each node so as to minimise the maximum path from the root to any leaf node. As items are inserted and deleted, the tree is restructured to keep the nodes balanced and the search paths uniform. Such an algorithm is appropriate where the overheads of the reorganisation on update are outweighed by the benefits of faster search. A B-tree is a kind of balanced tree that can have more than two subtrees at each node (i.e. one that is not restricted to being a binary tree).
- ballet dancer — a man or woman who takes part in ballet dancing, usually professionally
- band spectrum — a spectrum consisting of a number of bands of closely spaced lines that are associated with emission or absorption of radiation by molecules
- band together — If people band together, they meet and act as a group in order to try and achieve something.
- basket dinner — a group social gathering, as of church members, to which participants contribute casseroles or other dishes to share.
- bastard amber — a color of gelatin commonly used in stage lighting, similar to light amber but having a pinkish cast.
- bastard eigne — the first-born illegitimate son of parents whose second son was legitimate.
- bastard title — half title (def 1).
- bastard-title — Also called bastard title. the first printed page of certain books, appearing after the end papers and before the title page and containing only the title of the book.
- bat-eared fox — a fox, Vulpes chama, inhabiting dry areas of southern Africa and having large pointed ears, silvery gray coat, and a bushy tail with a black tip.
- battered wife — See under battered woman syndrome.
- batting order — the sequence in which hitters will bat in a given game, determined in advance by the team manager.
- battlegrounds — Plural form of battleground.
- beat the drum — a musical percussion instrument consisting of a hollow, usually cylindrical, body covered at one or both ends with a tightly stretched membrane, or head, which is struck with the hand, a stick, or a pair of sticks, and typically produces a booming, tapping, or hollow sound.
- beauty editor — the person in charge of a section of newspaper or magazine devoted to cosmetics, etc
- beetlebrained — stupid
- benefit fraud — the illegal activity of claiming benefit payments which a person is not entitled to
- berchtesgaden — a town in Germany, in SE Bavaria: site of the fortified mountain retreat of Adolf Hitler. Pop: 7667 (2003 est)
- bidirectional — (of a printhead) capable of printing from left to right and from right to left
- big-heartedly — in a big-hearted manner
- birthday cake — a special cake eaten at a birthday party
- biscuit bread — biscuits or a biscuit: I like biscuit bread more than corn bread for supper.
- bitter almond — a variety of almond whose bitter seeds yield hydrocyanic acid upon hydrolysis
- black-hearted — evil, malicious, or wicked
- board meeting — a meeting of the board of a company or other organization
- body snatcher — (formerly) a person who robbed graves and sold the corpses for dissection
- booby-trapped — (of a building, vehicle, etc) planted with a booby trap
- border patrol — a government agency in charge of preventing terrorists, weapons, and illegal immigrants entering the country
- border states — slave states bordering on the free states before the Civil War: Mo., Ky., Va., Md., & Del.
- bottled water — water sold in bottles
- bottom drawer — a young woman's collection of clothes, linen, cutlery, etc, in anticipation of marriage
- brace and bit — a hand tool for boring holes, consisting of a cranked handle into which a drilling bit is inserted
- brandy butter — butter and sugar creamed together with brandy and served with Christmas pudding, etc
- break it down — stop it