reverse spelling

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɹɪˈvɝs ˌspɛlɪŋ/

Noun

reverse spelling (countable and uncountable, plural reverse spellings)

1. The spelling or writing of a word in reverse or from back to front.

   Hyponyms: anadrome, semordnilap

   • 2006 November 1, Suzanne Hidi, Pietro Boscolo, “Mark Twain's Writers' Workshop”, in Writing and Motivation‎^[1], Brill, page 177:

     Teaching assistants monitored accuracy of reverse spelling. Later in the session, students were asked to spell words in writing from each of the word sets practiced in the session.

   • 2013, Seth Taylor, Left-Wing Nietzscheans: The Politics of German Expressionism 1910-1920‎^[2], page 117:

     He is perhaps better known for his grotesque tales which he published in a variety of Expressionist journals under the pseudonym Mynona, a reverse spelling of the German word for anonymous.

   • 2014, Holly Tuokko, Thomas Hadjistavropoulos, An Assessment Guide To Geriatric Neuropsychology‎^[3], page 124:

     Reverse spelling is one example of the ability to reverse a sequential order that is difficult for persons with aphasia (language impairment) or other organic mental disorders (Bender, 1975). Reverse spelling has been incorporated into some screening measures for cognitive impairment (e.g. the Mini-Mental State Examination and the Modified Mini-Mental State Examination, see chap. 3) and examined, in its own right, in relation to age.

2. A specific spelling of a word representing a phonetic feature never present in it, but present in other words in the same phonetic environment (and later lost); an inverse spelling.
   • 1947, The University of Michigan Contributions in Modern Philology‎^[4], volumes 1-10, page 9:

     The loss of ȝ between a front vowel and t, which Wyld finds in the middle of the fifteenth century but assigns to an earlier date,³⁵ is shown by both rhyme and spelling in knyght:whight (white) 562-63. The reverse spelling occurs again in whiȝte 566.

   • 1977, Stephen William Omeltchenko, A Quantitative and Comparative Study of the Vocalism of the Latin Inscriptions of North Africa, Britain, Dalmatia, and the Balkans‎^[5], page 399:

     […] several cases of reverse spelling of ae for /ē/, especially in accented syllable^[sic], however, do show that a close pronunciation of the e from ae was possible, and the Romance languages do posit a close /ē/ for some words.

   • 1992, Folia Linguistica Historica: Acta Societatis Linguisticae Europaeae‎^[6], volume 11, numbers 1-2, page 77:

     Beside ninety-odd correct ea spellings, Belfour IX has twelve plainly monophthongized and one reverse spelling, with a penumbra of phonetically special cases.

See also

• ananym