limerick

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“
The following example of a limerick is of anonymous origin. anybody to help me clear my doubts on this?

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Definitions (6)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. noun A light humorous, nonsensical, or bawdy verse of five anapestic lines usually with the rhyme scheme aabba.

Toggle Century definitions Century Dictionary (2)

Toggle GNU Webster definitions GNU Webster's 1913 (1)

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Examples (50)

  • For instance, I heard him quote the following limerick which had been constructed by a friend of mine named Asimov, who'll play his part in these events later. —  Isaac Asimov - Murder at the ABA
  • It's this result that prompted some anonymous poet to write the following limerick: A mathematician confided That a Mobius band is one-sided, And you'll get quite a laugh, If you cut one in half, For it stays in one piece when divided. —  F ;SF; - vol 096 issue 02 - February 1999
  • A lighter Rue Morgue offering is the 1942 satire The Widening Stain ($14.95), a limerick-strewn academic mystery by Cornell University literature scholar Morris Bishop, writing as W. Bolingbroke Johnson. —  EQMM,March-April2008
  • Extra points to the commenter who writes a relevant and metrically correct limerick which begins, "There once was a man from Ronkonkoma ..." —  Reason Magazine - Hit & Run
  • JIVERLY VOONG has name that sond like the start of a limerick or a game of —  Anorak News
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This word has been looked up 105 times.

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Etymologies (2)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. After Limerick .

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (1)

  1. Said to have originated in the words “Will you come up to Limerick,” occurring in the chorus of convivial songs of the character described in def. 1. See N. and Q., 9th ser., II. 470 (Dec. 10, 1898).
 

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/ˈlɪmərɪk/
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