Sublime defining

Sandra stared at her plate of sausage and mash in dismay. This was the fifth time her father had cooked it in a week. There must be a word to explain her state of mind. English did not have one, but what about TagalogA language spoken in the Philippines.? Ah, yes! "Umay": "The feeling of having had too much of the same food over and over again, so that you cannot face another bite of it."

English is thought to have 171,146 words currently in use - but sometimes that does not feel like enough. Other languages have many words for which there is no English synonymA word that means the same thing as another word. .

Take the German "Kabelsalat". It literally means "cable salad", and is what you find when the wires from all of your electrical devices get tangled up, apparently of their own accord.

Then there is the Arabic "soubhiye", which means a moment when you are the first person in the house to wake up and can enjoy a cup of coffee in peace before the demands of the day begin.

The American dictionary company Merriam-Webster recently made an appeal on social media for more examples. It received nearly 2,000 suggestions, from languages as varied as Nahuatl (originally used by the AztecsThe most powerful Central American civilisation in 1492, when Europeans first made sustained contact with the Americans. Their civilisation was destroyed by the Spanish, who enslaved what was left of their people.) and Japanese.

They included the German "verschlimmbessern", meaning to try to make something better but end up accidentally making it worse. Another was the Japanese "tsonduku", meaning to buy new books even though you have a large number at home which you have not got round to reading yet.

Swedish has "tidsoptimist", applied to someone who always believes that they will get there on time but never manages to. "Iktsuarpok" in InuitGroups of indigenous peoples living in the Arctic and subarctic regions. describes the mixture of excitement and anxiety you feel when someone is about to arrive.

"Apapachar", a Nahuatl word commonly used in Latin America, has been defined as "to throw all of your love to someone when they need it the most". It literally means "to hug with the soul".

Some words are particularly revealing about the places they come from. "Umarell" describes an old man in BolognaA city in northern Italy. who meets others at the edge of a building site to comment on the work that is going on. "Kalsarikannit" is a Finnish term for staying at home and getting drunk in your underwear.

"Sometimes we just have to bow to the majesty of other tongues," says Susie Dent, the lexicographerA person who makes dictionaries. and star of Countdown.¹ "I've always cherished the 'untranslatables'. My first love was German and I've always marvelled at its ability to be built up like Lego into mammoth constructions."

But she points out that there are also long-forgotten British words which need detailed explanation. A "mumpsimus" is a person who insists that he or she is right despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. "Groaking" is looking enviously at something that belongs to someone else.  

In ScotsA West Germanic language spoken in Scotland and parts of Ireland. , "tartling" means hesitating when you have to introduce someone but have totally forgotten their name.

Yes: According to a theory called linguistic relativity, language affects the way we see and understand the world. We cannot feel something unless we already have a word to describe it.

No: The reason we find many words without English synonyms so fascinating is that they describe things we feel but have never been able to pin down in our own language. "Itsuarpok" is a perfect example.  

Or... New words excite us because it is extremely difficult to come up with good ones. Many recent additions to English are unimaginative and clumsy: "selfie" and "virtue-signalling", for instance.