14-letter words containing p, e, n, r
- apple turnover — a pastry containing apple
- appleton layer — the F region of the ionosphere
- apportionments — Plural form of apportionment.
- appreciational — gratitude; thankful recognition: They showed their appreciation by giving him a gold watch.
- apprehensively — uneasy or fearful about something that might happen: apprehensive for the safety of the mountain climbers.
- apprenticement — apprenticeship
- apprenticeship — Someone who has an apprenticeship works for a fixed period of time for a person who has a particular skill in order to learn the skill. Apprenticeship is the system of learning a skill like this.
- approximeeting — the practice of a group of people making indefinite plans to meet and then altering those plans regularly via mobile phones according to changing circumstances
- archencephalon — the primitive forebrain region of the embryo, anterior to the notochord, that gives rise to the midbrain and forebrain.
- ardent spirits — spirits, such as rum, whisky, etc
- argus pheasant — either of two pheasants, Argusianus argus (great argus) or Rheinardia ocellata (crested argus), occurring in SE Asia and Indonesia. The males have very long tails marked with eyelike spots
- armor-piercing — (of bullets, artillery shells, etc.) designed especially for piercing armor.
- arms inspector — a person who carries out an arms inspection
- arriere-pensee — an unrevealed thought or intention
- asparagus bean — a trailing, long-stemmed Asian vine, Vigna unguiculata sesquipedalis, of the legume family, having yellow or violet flowers and very long pods.
- asparagus fern — a fernlike species of asparagus, A. plumosus, native to southern Africa
- assemblyperson — a member of a legislative assembly, especially a member of the lower house of the legislature in certain states of the U.S.
- asthenospermia — (medicine) Loss or reduction in the strength or energy of sperm cells, hence infertility. Not always infertile many are subfertile.
- asthenospermic — (medicine) Characterised by or pertaining to asthenospermia, hence infertile.
- asthenospheric — relating to the asthenosphere
- at one's peril — If you say that someone does something at their peril, you are warning them that they will probably suffer as a result of doing it.
- audio response — a computer response that is audible rather than textual or graphical
- autoresponders — Plural form of autoresponder.
- balance spring — hairspring.
- banana problem — (programming, humour) From the story of the little girl who said "I know how to spell "banana", but I don't know when to stop". Not knowing where or when to bring a production to a close (compare fencepost error). One may say "there is a banana problem" of an algorithm with poorly defined or incorrect termination conditions, or in discussing the evolution of a design that may be succumbing to featuritis (see also creeping elegance, creeping featuritis).
- bancroft prize — one of a group of annual awards for literary achievement in American history and biography: administered by Columbia University.
- bare ownership — ownership of a piece of property without the right to use and derive profit from that property
- benday process — a process for adding tone or shading, as in reproducing drawings, by the overlay on the plate of patterns, as of dots
- beta-endorphin — a potent endorphin released by the anterior pituitary gland in response to pain, trauma, exercise, or other forms of stress.
- beveridge plan — the plan for comprehensive social insurance, proposed by Sir William Beveridge in Great Britain in 1941.
- beyond compare — If you describe something as beyond compare, you mean that it is extremely good or extremely great.
- bidding prayer — the formal petitionary prayer, said especially in the Anglican Church immediately before the sermon.
- binary package — (software) An archive file that contains all files and directories that must be installed in order to make a working installation of the program(s) included in the package, and the maintainer scripts necessary for the installation. A binary package is usually specific to a certain platform, in contrast to a source package.
- bioprospecting — searching for plant or animal species for use as a source of commercially exploitable products, such as medicinal drugs
- black panthers — (in the US) a militant Black political party founded in 1965 to end the political dominance of White people
- blotting paper — Blotting paper is thick soft paper that you use for soaking up and drying ink on a piece of paper.
- bodice-ripping — A bodice-ripping film or novel is one which is set in the past and which includes a lot of sex scenes. You use this word especially if you do not think it is very good and is just intended to entertain people.
- bone porcelain — bone china.
- bow and scrape — to behave in an excessively deferential or obsequious way
- bowstring hemp — a hemplike fibre obtained from the sansevieria
- breaking point — If something or someone has reached breaking point, they have so many problems or difficulties that they can no longer cope with them, and may soon collapse or be unable to continue.
- breast implant — an object such as a sachet filled with gel introduced surgically into a woman's breast to enlarge it
- briefing paper — a document providing relevant facts and information
- britney spears — beers
- brownie points — a credit toward advancement or good standing gained especially by currying favor.
- building paper — any of various types of heavy-duty paper that usually consist of bitumen reinforced with fibre sandwiched between two sheets of kraft paper: used in damp-proofing or as insulation between the soil and a road surface
- burn-in period — 1. (testing) A factory soak test intended to increase the chance that components that fail early due to infant mortality will fail before the system leaves the factory. 2. (jargon) When one is so intensely involved in a new project that one forgets basic needs such as food, drink and sleep. Excessive burn-in can lead to burn-out. See hack mode, larval stage.
- bush carpenter — a rough-and-ready unskilled workman
- business reply — a form of mail, as a postcard, letter, or envelope, usually sent as an enclosure, and which can be mailed back by respondents without their having to pay postage.
- businessperson — Businesspeople are people who work in business.