16-letter words containing t, h, e, c, l
- scheduled castes — (in India) the official name given to the lower castes that are now protected by the government and offered special concessions.
- schlieren method — a method for detecting regions of differing densities in a clear fluid by photographing a beam of light passed obliquely through it.
- schmaltz herring — herring caught just before spawning, when it has much fat
- school committee — (in New Zealand) a parent group selected to support a primary school
- school inspector — an official whose job is to inspect schools and to report on their quality and conditions
- schoolteacherish — showing characteristics thought to be typical of a schoolteacher, as strictness and primness.
- schouten islands — a group of islands belonging to Papua New Guinea, in the Pacific Oceans, off the N coast of New Guinea.
- sclerenchymatous — supporting or protective tissue composed of thickened, dry, and hardened cells.
- scotch blackface — one of a Scottish breed of mountain sheep having a black face and growing long, coarse wool.
- seleucia trachea — an ancient city in SE Asia Minor, on the River Calycadnus (modern Goksu Nehri): captured by the Turks in the 13th century; site of present-day Silifke (Turkey)
- self-enhancement — to raise to a higher degree; intensify; magnify: The candlelight enhanced her beauty.
- shag pile carpet — a large piece of thick material with a nap of long rough strands that you put on a floor
- shirring elastic — elastic used for shirring
- silky flycatcher — any of several passerine birds of the family Ptilogonatidae, of the southwestern U.S. to Panama, related to the waxwings.
- slap in the face — smack on the cheek
- slap on the back — to congratulate
- social gathering — party, get-together
- sole stockholder — the only person who holds shares in a business
- south charleston — a city in W West Virginia.
- spectroheliogram — a photograph of the sun made with a spectroheliograph.
- speech pathology — the scientific study and treatment of defects, disorders, and malfunctions of speech and voice, as stuttering, lisping, or lalling, and of language disturbances, as aphasia or delayed language acquisition.
- st. clair shores — a city in SE Michigan, near Detroit.
- st. lucie cherry — mahaleb.
- stannic chloride — a colorless fuming and caustic liquid, SnCl 4 , soluble in water and alcohol, that converts with water to a crystalline solid: used for electrically conductive and electroluminescent coatings and in ceramics.
- stannic sulphide — an insoluble solid compound of tin usually existing as golden crystals or as a yellowish-brown powder: used as a pigment. Formula: SnS2
- steal a march on — to walk with regular and measured tread, as soldiers on parade; advance in step in an organized body.
- stilton (cheese) — a rich, crumbly cheese with veins of blue-green mold
- summa theologica — a philosophical and theological work (1265–74) by St. Thomas Aquinas, consisting of an exposition of Christian doctrine.
- taft-hartley act — an act of the U.S. Congress (1947) that supersedes but continues most of the provisions of the National Labor Relations Act and that, in addition, provides for an eighty-day injunction against strikes that endanger public health and safety and bans closed shops, featherbedding, secondary boycotts, jurisdictional strikes, and certain other union practices.
- teachable moment — a specific occurrence, situation, or experience that can be used to teach people about something more general: Her death created a teachable moment about prescription drug abuse.
- teachers college — a four-year college offering courses for the training of primary and secondary school teachers and granting the bachelor's degree and often advanced degrees.
- technical school — college of further and vocational education
- telescopic sight — a telescope mounted on a rifle, etc, used for sighting
- tephrochronology — a geochronologic technique based on the dating of layers of volcanic ash.
- thalamencephalon — the diencephalon.
- the black forest — a hilly wooded region of SW Germany, in Baden-Württemberg: a popular resort area
- the body politic — the people of a nation or the nation itself considered as a political entity; the state
- the christ child — a very reverential way of referring to Jesus Christ as a child, used particularly when referring to art
- the commonwealth — the government in England under the Cromwells and Parliament from 1649 to 1660
- the creole state — a nickname for Louisiana
- the early church — the Christian church in the centuries immediately following Christ's death
- the eastern bloc — (formerly) the Soviet bloc
- the eternal city — Rome
- the first couple — the US president and their spouse
- the gentle craft — fishing
- the leonine city — a district of Rome on the right bank of the Tiber fortified by Pope Leo IV
- the long paddock — a stockroute or roadside area offering feed to sheep and cattle in dry times
- the open college — (in Britain) a college of art founded in 1987 for mature students studying foundation courses in arts and crafts by television programmes, written materials, and tutorials
- the public purse — money from or controlled by the government
- the two sicilies — a former kingdom of S Italy, consisting of the kingdoms of Sicily and Naples (1061–1860)