17-letter words containing h, o, n, s, u
- psycholinguistics — the study of the relationship between language and the cognitive or behavioral characteristics of those who use it.
- pull one's weight — the amount or quantity of heaviness or mass; amount a thing weighs.
- push the envelope — a flat paper container, as for a letter or thin package, usually having a gummed flap or other means of closure.
- put on the gloves — to box
- put one's hand to — the terminal, prehensile part of the upper limb in humans and other primates, consisting of the wrist, metacarpal area, fingers, and thumb.
- put the kibosh on — nonsense.
- put the screws on — a metal fastener having a tapered shank with a helical thread, and topped with a slotted head, driven into wood or the like by rotating, especially by means of a screwdriver.
- rhodope mountains — a mountain range in SE Europe, in the Balkan Peninsula extending along the border between Bulgaria and Greece. Highest peak: Golyam Perelik (Bulgaria), 2191 m (7188 ft)
- run short/run low — If you are running short of something or running low on something, you do not have much of it left. If a supply of something is running short or running low, there is not much of it left.
- rush one's fences — to proceed with precipitate haste
- russian wolfhound — borzoi.
- sandringham house — a residence of the royal family, in Sandringham, a village in E England, in Norfolk near the E shore of the Wash
- sandwich compound — any of a class of organometallic compounds whose molecules have a metal atom or ion bound between two plane parallel organic rings
- sawatch mountains — range of the Rocky Mountains, in central Colo.: highest peak, Elbert
- sawed-off shotgun — rifle with a short barrel
- school counsellor — a counsellor who is based in a school
- school playground — school's outdoor recreation area
- settlement houses — the act or state of settling or the state of being settled.
- sheltered housing — accommodation designed esp for the elderly or infirm consisting of a group of individual premises, often with some shared facilities and a caretaker
- shetland pullover — a thick woollen sweater made from Shetland wool
- shirt-tail cousin — a distant cousin
- shoot one's cuffs — to expose one's shirt cuffs beyond the coat sleeves
- shouting distance — hailing distance.
- show in (or out) — to usher into (or out of) a given place
- sixty-fourth note — a note having one sixty-fourth of the time value of a whole note; hemidemisemiquaver.
- skin of our teeth — a play (1942) by Thornton Wilder.
- smoothing circuit — a circuit used to remove ripple from the output of a direct current power supply
- socratic elenchus — the drawing out of the consequences of a position in order to show them to be contrary to some accepted position
- south farmingdale — a town on central Long Island, in SE New York.
- south frigid zone — the part of the earth's surface between the Antarctic Circle and the South Pole.
- south lanarkshire — a council area of S Scotland, comprising the S part of the historical county of Lanarkshire: included within Strathclyde Region from 1975 to 1996: has uplands in the S and part of the Glasgow conurbation in the N: mainly agricultural. Administrative centre: Hamilton. Pop: 303 010 (2003 est). Area: 1771 sq km (684 sq miles)
- south sea company — a British joint stock company that traded in South America in the 18th century. The South Sea Company took over the national debt in return for a monopoly of trade with the South Seas, causing feverish speculation in their stocks, and a financial crash in 1720 (the South Sea Bubble)
- south sea islands — the islands in the S Pacific that constitute Oceania
- southampton water — an inlet of the English Channel in S England
- southern rhodesia — a former name (until 1964) of Zimbabwe (def 1).
- southern sporades — a group of Greek islands in the Aegean, including the Dodecanese, lying off the SW coast of Turkey
- southern studfish — See under studfish.
- southern triangle — the constellation Triangulum Australe.
- squash vine borer — the larva of a clearwing moth, Melittia satyriniformis, that bores into the stems of squash and related plants.
- stannous chloride — a white, crystalline, water-soluble solid, SnCl 2 ⋅2H 2 O, used chiefly as a reducing and tinning agent, and as a mordant in dyeing with cochineal.
- stretch limousine — a limousine that has been lengthened to provide extra seating accommodation and more legroom
- stretching course — (in brickwork) a course of stretchers.
- sulfonyl chloride — a colorless liquid, SO 2 Cl 2 , having a very pungent odor and corrosive to the skin and mucous membranes: used as a chlorinating or sulfonating agent.
- sunbury-on-thames — a town in SE England, in N Surrey. Pop: 27 415 (2001)
- support mechanism — any formal system or method of providing support or assistance
- surprise symphony — the Symphony No. 94 in G major (1791) by Franz Josef Haydn.
- swainson's thrush — a North American thrush, Catharus ustulatus, having olive upper parts and wintering south to Argentina.
- synchronous motor — a synchronous machine that acts as a motor.
- synchronous orbit — an orbit in which the orbital period of a satellite is identical to the spin period of the central body
- synchronous speed — the speed at which an alternating-current machine must operate to generate electromotive force at a given frequency.