By "double", I mean the same letter twice. There are many double consonant 4 letter words. There are also many double vowel 4 letters words. However, are there any which include all three of these restrictions, specifically, in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary
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2This seems more appropriate for puzzles.stackexchange.com– MitchCommented Oct 11, 2019 at 20:46
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1Using a regexp search on unix /usr/share/dict/words, there are none. There are many that end in a double vowel, 6 that begin with a double vowel (eely, oofy, oons, oont, oord, oozy, all very questionable words), and none that begin or end in double consonants. Double consonants only exist in English orthography from two words that have come to be spelled without a space, and since there are no single consonant words in English, a double consonant at the end or beginning of a word is impossible.– MitchCommented Oct 11, 2019 at 21:02
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1If you relax your conditions and allow VCCV or CVVC, then you get acca adda affa amma anna atta elle immi otto, or boob deed keek maam noon peep poop teet toot, also many of these are questionably acceptable words.– MitchCommented Oct 11, 2019 at 21:03
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1I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because it is about trivia, and suitable for puzzles.stackexchange.com.– Edwin AshworthCommented Oct 12, 2019 at 14:10
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2I'm voting once again to close this question as off-topic because it is about trivia, and suitable for puzzles.stackexchange.com.– Edwin AshworthCommented Nov 9, 2020 at 14:22
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2 Answers
Yes, but probably not in Merriam Webster. Looking at the OED, there's ooff:
Scottish. Obsolete. rare.
intransitive. To move (about) in a stupid manner.
If it doesn't need to have consonants, the OED also lists ooaa ("The Kauai oo, Moho braccatus, which is believed to have become extinct in the late 1980s"). If it doesn't need to have vowels that might be pushing the definition of word, but the OED has XXXX ("Used as a humorously euphemistic substitute for a four-letter swear word").
If CVCV/VCVC/CVVC/VCCV is allowed, then I'm using the power of regex with grep -i -E '^(.)(.)(\1\2|\2\1)$' /usr/share/dict/words, which gets me:
acca, adad, adda, affa, amma, anan, anna, arar, atta, baba, bibi, bobo, boob, coco, dada, deed, dodo, elle, eyey, gogo, gugu, immi, juju, kaka, keek, kiki, koko, kuku, lulu, maam, momo, nana, noon, otto, papa, peep, pipi, poop, ruru, sasa, sisi, soso, susu, teet, tete, titi, toot, toto, tutu, wawa, yaya
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SEES is another extremely common word that is not in your list.– shooverCommented Oct 12, 2019 at 15:12
Fun question. None, according to Wolfram Alpha:
- aa__ (https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=aa__)
- __aa (https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=__aa)
- ee__ (https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=ee__)
- __ee (https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=__ee)
etc.
The only result that matches your constraint of double vowel and double consonant is "xxii", but it doesn't qualify as a word :-)
