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  1. Esperanto love

Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. n. An artificial international language with a vocabulary based on word roots common to many European languages and a regularized system of inflection.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. n. The name of a recent ‘universal language’ constructed, like Volapük, by arbitrary reduction and manipulation of words and forms taken from existing European languages, and the adoption of a simple and regular inflection. The general aspect of the language as printed is that of a shrunken composite of Latin, Spanish, and French, with a Polynesian spelling.

Wiktionary

  1. n. The name of an international auxiliary language designed by L. L. Zamenhof with a base vocabulary inspired by Indo-European languages such as English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, and Russian, and having a streamlined grammar with completely regular conjugations, declensions, and inflections.
  2. n. figuratively Anything that is used as a single international medium in place of plural distinct national media.

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. n. An artificial language, intended to be universal, devised by Dr. Zamenhof, a Russian, who adopted the pseudonym “Dr. Esperanto” in publishing his first pamphlet regarding it in 1887. The vocabulary is very largely based upon words common to the chief European languages, and sounds peculiar to any one language are eliminated. The spelling is phonetic, and the accent (stress) is always on the penult. A revised and simplified form, called ido was developed in 1907, but Esperanto remained at the end of the 20th century the most popular aritficial language designed for normal human linguistic communication.

WordNet 3.0

  1. n. an artificial language based as far as possible on words common to all the European languages

Etymologies

  1. From Esperanto esperanto ("one who hopes"), from French espérer, from Latin sperare ("to hope"). Originally, this was the pseudonym assumed by the language's creator, L. L. Zamenhof, and the language was called Lingvo Internacia ("international language"). (Wiktionary)
  2. After Dr. Esperanto, "one who hopes,” pseudonym of Ludwik Lejzer Zamenhof (1859-1917), Polish philologist. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)

Examples

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Lists

These user-created lists contain the word ‘Esperanto’.

Comments

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  • bourbonmots Bah! That’s just some people talking. Sep 13, 2011

  • ruzuzu Why do you hate freedom, oh freedom? Sep 12, 2011

  • bourbonmots You know I've got my reasons. Sep 12, 2011

  • bilby You been out writin' tenses for so long now. Sep 11, 2011

  • bourbonmots Sorry? Sep 11, 2011

  • bilby Why don't you come to your senses? Sep 11, 2011

  • bourbonmots Worth mentioning, but probably doesn’t qualify for the Solutions list as it was a noble but failed attempt to facilitate global communication. Sep 11, 2011

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‘Esperanto’ has been looked up 1295 times, loved by 1 person, added to 5 lists, commented on 7 times, and is not a valid Scrabble word.