12-letter words containing h, a, w, o
- hammer throw — a field event in which the hammer is thrown for distance.
- hand of writ — handwriting; penmanship.
- hand-me-down — an article of clothing passed on to another person after being used, outgrown, etc.: The younger children wore the hand-me-downs of the older ones.
- hangchow bay — a bay of the East China Sea.
- hangtown fry — a type of omelet to which fried oysters, bacon, and sometimes onions are added.
- hansa yellow — a pigment derived from coal tar, characterized chiefly by its brilliant yellow color.
- hard-working — industrious; zealous: a hardworking family man.
- harmonic law — any one of three laws governing planetary motion: each planet revolves in an ellipse, with the sun at one focus; the line connecting a planet to the sun sweeps out equal areas in equal periods of time (law of areas) or the square of the period of revolution of each planet is proportional to the cube of the semimajor axis of the planet's orbit (harmonic law)
- harper woods — a city in SE Michigan, near Detroit.
- havana brown — a breed of medium-sized cat with large eyes, large ears, and a sleek brown coat
- heaven knows — You can say 'Heaven knows' to emphasize that you do not know something, or that you find something very surprising.
- henceforward — from now on; from this point forward.
- henry howard — Earl of (Henry Howard) 1517?–47, English poet.
- here and now — in this place; in this spot or locality (opposed to there): Put the pen here.
- high and low — having a great or considerable extent or reach upward or vertically; lofty; tall: a high wall.
- highway code — In Britain, the Highway Code is an official book published by the Department of Transport, which contains the rules which tell people how to use public roads safely.
- hollywoodian — a person who works for the motion-picture industry located in Hollywood, Calif.
- hot swapping — (hardware) The connection and disconnection of peripherals or other components without interrupting system operation. This facility may have design implications for both hardware and software.
- house wizard — (Probably from ad-agency tradetalk, "house freak") A hacker occupying a technical-specialist, R&D, or systems position at a commercial shop. A really effective house wizard can have influence out of all proportion to his/her ostensible rank and still not have to wear a suit. Used especially of Unix wizards. The term "house guru" is equivalent.
- housewarming — a party to celebrate a person's or family's move to a new home.
- how are you? — what is your state of health?
- how dare you — You say 'how dare you' when you are very shocked and angry about something that someone has done.
- in hot water — If you are in hot water, you are in trouble.
- leatherwoods — Plural form of leatherwood.
- lord haw-haw — James (Augustine Aloysius) 1882–1941, Irish novelist.
- machine word — word (def 10).
- machine-word — a unit of language, consisting of one or more spoken sounds or their written representation, that functions as a principal carrier of meaning. Words are composed of one or more morphemes and are either the smallest units susceptible of independent use or consist of two or three such units combined under certain linking conditions, as with the loss of primary accent that distinguishes black·bird· from black· bird·. Words are usually separated by spaces in writing, and are distinguished phonologically, as by accent, in many languages.
- macroweather — Longer term average weather, covering period of length between that of weather and climate.
- make whoopee — make whoopee, to engage in uproarious merrymaking.
- marsh mallow — an Old World mallow, Althaea officinalis, having pink flowers, found in marshy places.
- marshalltown — a city in central Iowa.
- marshmallows — Plural form of marshmallow.
- marshmallowy — Similar to a marshmallow.
- nakhon sawan — a city in W central Thailand, on the Chao Phraya River.
- naughty word — a word that is considered to be rude
- newfashioned — Alternative form of new-fashioned.
- noahide laws — the seven laws given to Noah after the Flood, which decree the establishment of a fair system of justice in society, and prohibit idolatry, blasphemy, murder, adultery and incest, robbery, and the eating of flesh taken from a living animal
- now and then — occasionally
- nowhere near — in or at no place; not anywhere: The missing pen was nowhere to be found.
- off the wall — of or relating to a wall: wall space.
- off-the-wall — markedly unconventional; bizarre; oddball: an unpredictable, off-the-wall personality.
- old-womanish — Sometimes Offensive. having characteristics considered typical of an old woman, as excessive fussiness or timidity.
- on the wagon — any of various kinds of four-wheeled vehicles designed to be pulled or having its own motor and ranging from a child's toy to a commercial vehicle for the transport of heavy loads, delivery, etc.
- on the watch — to be alertly on the lookout, look attentively, or observe, as to see what comes, is done, or happens: to watch while an experiment is performed.
- one-man show — a show with only one performer
- onward march — the continuing, advancing or improving movement (of situation, etc)
- out of whack — to strike with a smart, resounding blow or blows.
- pasch flower — pasqueflower
- phonetic law — a statement of some regular pattern of sound change in a specific language, as Grimm's law or Verner's law.
- polish wheat — a wheat, Triticum polonicum, grown chiefly in S Europe, N Africa, and Turkestan.