Portmanteau Word: Word blending the sounds and combining the meanings of two or more others (e.g. smoke + fog → smog)
A portmanteau word (/pɔːrtˈmæntoʊ/ (listen)) is made of other words, or parts of words.
It comes from putting two (or more) other words together, like motel, from motor and hotel.
Origin
Portmanteau originally meant a type of suitcase with two separate parts for storage. The first use as a word combination appeared in Lewis Carroll's book Through the Looking-Glass. There Humpty Dumpty explains that some of the unusual words in Jabberwocky are other words packed together into one word, as two parts of a portmanteau suitcase are packed together.
Examples
Portmanteau itself is an example, combining the French words for carry (porter) and coat (manteau) into a coat carrier. Wiki is a portmanteau of wiki (Hawaiian for fast) and encyclopedia.
References
Related pages
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