12-letter words containing p, a, r, w
- school prawn — a common olive-green prawn, Metapenaeus macleayi
- sepak takraw — a game originating in South Asia in which two teams kick a ball back and forth over a net
- shadow price — the calculated price of a good or service for which no market price exists
- shadowgraphy — the production of a shadowgraph
- sharp-witted — having or showing mental acuity; intellectually discerning; acute.
- shop steward — commerce: union rep
- sloop of war — (formerly) a sailing or steam naval vessel having cannons on only one deck.
- snow leopard — a long-haired, leopardlike feline, Panthera (Uncia) uncia, of mountain ranges of central Asia, having a relatively small head and a thick, creamy-gray coat with rosette spots: an endangered species.
- song sparrow — a small emberizine songbird, Melospiza melodia, common in North America.
- space writer — a journalist or copywriter paid according to a space rate. Also called space man. Compare stringer (def 6).
- sparrow hawk — a small, short-winged European hawk, Accipiter nisus, that preys on smaller birds.
- sparrowgrass — asparagus.
- sponged ware — spongeware.
- spring water — water from natural underground source
- superhighway — a highway designed for travel at high speeds, having more than one lane for each direction of traffic, a safety strip dividing the two directions, and cloverleaves to route the traffic on and off the highway. Compare expressway.
- swamp rabbit — any of several southern cottontails, especially Sylvilagus aquaticus, of swamps and lowlands.
- swap trading — a contract in which the parties to it exchange liabilities on outstanding debts in trading
- tree sparrow — a Eurasian bird, Passer montanus, related to but smaller than the house sparrow.
- twin paradox — a phenomenon predicted by relativity. One of a pair of identical twins is supposed to live normally in an inertial system whilst the other is accelerated to a high speed in a spaceship, travels for a long time, and finally returns to rest beside his twin. The travelled twin will be found to be younger than his brother
- twisted pair — A twisted pair is a pair of wires that are twisted together to reduce interference.
- twitterpated — excited or overcome by romantic feelings; smitten.
- urban sprawl — the uncontrolled spread of urban development into neighboring regions.
- wackyparsing — (Internet, slang) present participle of wackyparse.
- walk-on part — acting role with no spoken lines
- walk-up rate — The walk-up rate at a hotel is the price charged to a customer who arrives without a reservation.
- wall creeper — a small, gray and crimson Old World bird, Tichodroma muraria, that inhabits cliffs in mountainous areas.
- wallpapering — Present participle of wallpaper.
- walter pater — Walter Horatio, 1839–94, English critic, essayist, and novelist.
- warmer-upper — something that provides one with invigorating warmth: Hot soup is a good warmer-upper after skiing.
- warp-knitted — designating a fabric made by warp knitting.
- water pepper — a widely distributed annual plant, Polygonum hydropiper, of marshes and bogs, characterized by acrid, peppery-tasting leaves.
- water pistol — a toy gun that shoots a stream of liquid.
- water pocket — a cavity at the foot of a cliff formed by the falling action of an intermittent stream.
- water spider — a Eurasian spider, Argyroneta aquatica, that spins a web in the form of an air-filled chamber in which it lives submerged in streams and ponds
- water splash — a place where a stream runs over a road
- water sports — a sport played or practiced on or in water, as swimming, water polo, or surfing.
- water sprite — a sprite or spirit inhabiting the water, as an undine.
- water sprout — a nonflowering shoot arising from a branch or axil of a tree or shrub.
- water supply — the supply of purified water available to a community.
- water vapour — steam
- watering pot — a container for water, typically of metal or plastic and having a spout with a perforated nozzle, for watering or sprinkling plants, flowers, etc.
- watermanship — the skill, duties, business, etc., of a waterman.
- waterproofed — Having been made waterproof.
- waterproofer — One who, or that which, makes waterproof.
- weaponeering — the act of fitting out with weapons
- weather ship — a ship equipped for meteorological observation.
- weatherproof — able to withstand exposure to all kinds of weather.
- weatherstrip — A strip of rubber, metal, or other material used to seal the edges of a door or window against the cold.
- web scraping — the extraction and copying of data from a website into a structured format using a computer program: Hackers pose a threat with techniques like web scraping. Our search engine uses web scraping to index sites.
- webliography — a list of electronic documents, websites, or other resources available on the World Wide Web, especially those relating to a particular subject: a student's annotated webliography on Shakespeare.