479 Unique Words and Phrases invented by Shakespeare to make English Language Resourceful

479 Unique Words & Phrases coined by Shakespeare

Of all poets and playwrights in English, Shakespeare has been unique and unrivalled. Shakespeare’s name shines blazingly in the broad-breasted firmament of poetic drama. He was an embodiment of Genius for the language itself – for his unique discovery of words and phrases which garnishes and enriches the store house of English.

Shakespeare’s Unique Phrases

• All our yesterdays (Macbeth)
• All that glitters is not gold (The Merchant of Venice)(“glisters”)
• All’s well that ends well (title)
• As good luck would have it (The Merry Wives of Windsor)
• As merry as the day is long (Much Ado About Nothing / King John)
• Bated breath (The Merchant of Venice)
• Bag and baggage (As You Like It / Winter’s Tale)
• Bear a charmed life (Macbeth)
• Be-all and the end-all (Macbeth)
• Beggar all description (Antony and Cleopatra)
• Better foot before (“best foot forward”) (King John)
• The better part of valor is discretion (I Henry IV; possibly already a known saying)
• In a better world than this (As You Like It)
• Neither a borrower nor a lender be (Hamlet)
• Brave new world (The Tempest)
• Break the ice (The Taming of the Shrew)
• Breathed his last (3 Henry VI)
• Brevity is the soul of wit (Hamlet)
• Refuse to budge an inch (Measure for Measure / Taming of the Shrew)
• Catch a cold (Cymbeline; claimed but seems unlikely, seems to refer to bad weather)
• Cold comfort (The Taming of the Shrew / King John)
• Conscience does make cowards of us all (Hamlet)
• Come what come may (“come what may”) (Macbeth)
• Comparisons are odorous (Much Ado about Nothing)
• Crack of doom (Macbeth)
• Dead as a doornail (2 Henry VI)
• A dish fit for the gods (Julius Caesar)
• Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of war (Julius Caesar)
• Dog will have his day (Hamlet; quoted earlier by Erasmus and Queen Elizabeth)
• Devil incarnate (Titus Andronicus / Henry V)
• Eaten me out of house and home (2 Henry IV)
• Elbow room (King John; first attested 1540 according to Merriam-Webster)
• Farewell to all my greatness (Henry VIII)
• Faint hearted (I Henry VI)
• Fancy-free (Midsummer Night’s Dream)
• Fight till the last gasp (I Henry VI)
• Flaming youth (Hamlet)
• Forever and a day (As You Like It)
• For goodness’ sake (Henry VIII)
• Foregone conclusion (Othello)
• Full circle (King Lear)
• The game is afoot (I Henry IV)
• The game is up (Cymbeline)
• Give the devil his due (I Henry IV)
• Good riddance (Troilus and Cressida)
• Jealousy is the green-eyed monster (Othello)
• It was Greek to me (Julius Caesar)
• Heart of gold (Henry V)
• Her infinite variety (Antony and Cleopatra)
• ‘Tis high time (The Comedy of Errors)
• Hoist with his own petard (Hamlet)
• Household words (Henry V)
• A horse, a horse! My kingdom for a horse! (Richard III)
• Ill wind which blows no man to good (2 Henry IV)
• Improbable fiction (Twelfth Night)
• In a pickle (The Tempest)
• In my heart of hearts (Hamlet)
• In my mind’s eye (Hamlet)
• Infinite space (Hamlet)
• Infirm of purpose (Macbeth)
• In my book of memory (I Henry VI)
• It is but so-so(As You Like It)
• It smells to heaven (Hamlet)
• Itching palm (Julius Caesar)
• Kill with kindness (Taming of the Shrew)
• Killing frost (Henry VIII)
• Knit brow (The Rape of Lucrece)
• Knock knock! Who’s there? (Macbeth)
• Laid on with a trowel (As You Like It)
• Laughing stock (The Merry Wives of Windsor)
• Laugh yourself into stitches (Twelfth Night)
• Lean and hungry look (Julius Caesar)
• Lie low (Much Ado about Nothing)
• Live long day (Julius Caesar)
• Love is blind (Merchant of Venice)
• Men’s evil manners live in brass; their virtues we write in water (Henry VIII)
• Melted into thin air (The Tempest)
• Though this be madness, yet there is method in it (“There’s a method to my madness”) (Hamlet)
• Make a virtue of necessity (The Two Gentlemen of Verona)
• The Makings of(Henry VIII)
• Milk of human kindness (Macbeth)
• Ministering angel (Hamlet)
• Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows (The Tempest)
• More honored in the breach than in the observance (Hamlet)
• More in sorrow than in anger (Hamlet)
• More sinned against than sinning (King Lear)
• Much Ado About Nothing (title)
• Murder most foul (Hamlet)
• Naked truth (Love’s Labours Lost)
• Neither rhyme nor reason (As You Like It)
• Not slept one wink (Cymbeline)
• Nothing in his life became him like the leaving it (Macbeth)
• [Obvious] as a nose on a man’s face (The Two Gentlemen of Verona)
• Once more into the breach (Henry V)
• One fell swoop (Macbeth)
• One that loved not wisely but too well (Othello)
• Time is out of joint (Hamlet)
• Out of the jaws of death (Twelfth Night)
• Own flesh and blood (Hamlet)
• Star-crossed lovers (Romeo and Juliet)
• Parting is such sweet sorrow (Romeo and Juliet)
• What’s past is prologue (The Tempest)
• [What] a piece of work [is man] (Hamlet)
• Pitched battle (Taming of the Shrew)
• A plague on both your houses (Romeo and Juliet)
• Play fast and loose (King John)
• Pomp and circumstance (Othello)
• [A poor] thing, but mine own (As You Like It)
• Pound of flesh (The Merchant of Venice)
• Primrose path (Hamlet)
• Quality of mercy is not strained (The Merchant of Venice)
• Salad days (Antony and Cleopatra)
• Sea change (The Tempest)
• Seen better days (As You Like It? Timon of Athens?)
• Send packing (I Henry IV)
• How sharper than the serpent’s tooth it is to have a thankless child (King Lear)
• Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day (Sonnets)
• Make short shrift (Richard III)
• Sick at heart (Hamlet)
• Snail paced (Troilus and Cressida)
• Something in the wind (The Comedy of Errors)
• Something wicked this way comes (Macbeth)
• A sorry sight (Macbeth)
• Sound and fury (Macbeth)
• Spotless reputation (Richard II)
• Stony hearted (I Henry IV)
• Such stuff as dreams are made on (The Tempest)
• Smooth runs the water where the brook is deep (“Still waters run deep”) (2 Henry VI)
• The short and the long of it (The Merry Wives of Windsor)
• Sweet are the uses of adversity (As You Like It)
• Sweets to the sweet (Hamlet)
• Swift as a shadow (A Midsummer Night’s Dream
• Tedious as a twice-told tale (King John)
• Set my teeth on edge (I Henry IV)
• Tell truth and shame the devil (1 Henry IV)
• Thereby hangs a tale (Othello; in context, this seems to have been already in use)
• There’s no such thing (?) (Macbeth)
• There’s the rub (Hamlet)
• This mortal coil (Hamlet)
• To gild refined gold, to paint the lily (“to gild the lily”) (King John)
• To thine own self be true (Hamlet)
• Too much of a good thing (As You Like It)
• Tower of strength (Richard III)
• Towering passion (Hamlet)
• Trippingly on the tongue (Hamlet)
• Truth will out (The Merchant of Venice)
• Violent delights have violent ends (Romeo and Juliet)
• Wear my heart upon my sleeve (Othello)
• What the dickens (The Merry Wives of Windsor)
• What’s done is done (Macbeth)
• What’s in a name? A rose by any other name would smell as sweet. (Romeo and Juliet)
• What fools these mortals be (A Midsummer Night’s Dream)
• What the dickens (The Merry Wives of Windsor)
• Wild-goose chase (Romeo and Juliet)
• Wish is father to that thought (2 Henry IV)
• Witching time of night (Hamlet)
• Working-day world (As You Like It)
• The world’s my oyster (Merry Wives of Windsor)
• Yeoman’s service (Hamlet)

• Shakespeare’s Words Coinage

• abstemious (The Tempest — a Latin word that meant “to abstain from alcoholic drink” was generalized to sexual behavior as well)
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• academe (Love’s Labour’s Lost; this is just an English form of “Academy”, the Greek for Plato’s grove)
• accommodation (Othello)
• accused (n.) (Richard II — first known use as a noun, meaning person accused of a crime)
• addiction (Henry V / Othello)
• admirable (several; seems unlikely)
• advertising (adj.)(Measure for Measure; in context, means “being attentive”; the noun was already in use)
• aerial (Othello)
• alligator (Romeo and Juliet; Spanish “aligarto” was already in use in English)
• amazement (13 instances; first known use as a noun)
• anchovy (I Henry IV; first attestation in English of the Spanish word for dried edible fish)
• apostrophe (“apostrophas”)(Love’s Labour’s Lost; seems to be a well-known word already)
• arch-villain (Measure for Measure / Timon of Athens)
• to arouse (2 Henry VI / Hamlet; “rouse” was the usual form)
• assassination (Macbeth; “assassin” was already in use and derives from “hashish eater”)
• auspicious (several; “auspice” was a Roman practice of fortune-telling by bird flight)
• bachelorship (I Henry VI)
• backing (I Henry VI; this is just a pun on a known word)
• bandit (II Henry VI, actually “bandetto”, the first attestation in English of a familiar Italian word for people “banned”, i.e., outlaws)
• barefaced (in the sense of “barefaced power”) (Macbeth)
• baseless (in the sense of fantasy without grounding in fact) (The Tempest)
• beached (several, merely means “possessing a beach”)
• bedazzled (The Taming of the Shrew)
• bedroom (A Midsummer Night’s Dream, merely means a place to sleep on the ground)
• belongings (Measure for Measure)
• to besmirch (Henry V)
• birthplace (Coriolanus; first attestation)
• to blanket (King Lear; first use as a verb)
• bloodstained (I Henry IV)
• blusterer (A Lover’s Complaint)
• bold-faced (I Henry VI)
• bottled (Richard III)
• bump (Romeo and Juliet; first attestation of onomopoeic word)
• buzzer (Hamlet; means gossipper)
• to cake (Timon of Athens, first attestation as a verb)
• to castigate (Timon of Athens)
• to cater (As You Like It; from coetous, a buyer of provisions)
• clangor (3 Henry VI / 2 Henry IV)
• to champion (Macbeth; first attestation as a verb, and in an older sense of “to challenge”; though the noun was familiar as someone who would fight for another)
• circumstantial (As You Like It / Cymbeline; first attestation in the sense of “indirect”)
• cold-blooded (King John; first use to mean “lack of emotion”)
• coldhearted (Antony and Cleopatra)
• compact (several; seems to have been a common word)
• to comply (Othello)
• to compromise (The Merchant of Venice, several of the histories; seems to have been already in use)
• to cow (Macbeth; first use in English of a Scandinavian verb)
• consanguineous (Twelfth Night; “consanguinity” was already in use)
• control (n.) (Twelfth Night)
• countless (Titus Andronicus / Pericles)
• courtship (several, seems unikely)
• critic (Love’s Labour’s Lost; Latin term)
• critical (not in today’s sense) (Othello, A Midsummer Night’s Dream)
• cruelhearted (The Two Gentlemen of Verona)
• Dalmatians (Cymbeline)
• dauntless (Macbeth)
• dawn (I Henry IV, King John; first use as a noun, the standard had been “dawning”)
• day’s work (several, must have been a common expression)
• deafening (II Henry IV; in the sense of a noise that is loud but does not produce real deafness)
• to denote (several; already a word in Latin)
• depository (???)
• discontent (Richard III / Titus Andronicus; the verb was in use but this is the first attestation as a noun)
• design (several, seems unlikely)
• dexterously (Twelfth Night)
• dialogue (several, seems already familiar)
• disgraceful (I Henry VI; means “not graceful”)
• dishearten (Henry V)
• to dislocate (King Lear, refers to anatomy)
• distasteful (Timon of Athens)
• distracted (Hamlet / Measure for Measure; seems possible)
• divest (Henry V / King Lear; probably already in use as referring to a royal title)
• domineering (Love’s Labour’s Lost; from a Dutch word)
• downstairs (I Henry IV, supposedly first use as an adjective)
• droplet (Timon of Athens)
• to drug (Macbeth; first use as a verb)
• to dwindle (I Henry IV / Macbeth, seems already familiar as a term for body wasting)
• to educate (Love’s Labour’s Lost)
• to elbow (King Lear; first use as a verb)
• embrace (I Henry VI; first use as a noun)
• employer (Much Ado about Nothing)
• employment (several, obviously familiar)
• engagement (several, seems simply the first attestation)
• to enmesh (Othello)
• to ensnare (Othello)
• enrapt (Troilus and Cressida)
• enthroned (Antony and Cleopatra)
• epileptic (King Lear; first use as an adjective, though the noun was old)
• equivocal (Othello / All’s Well that Ends Well; first use as adjective, though the verb “to equivocate” was familiar)
• eventful (As You Like It)
• excitement (Hamlet / Troilus and Cressida; both times as plural; first use as a noun)
• expedience (several, supposedly first use as noun)
• exposure (several, supposedly first use as noun)
• eyeball (The Tempest)
• eyedrops (II Henry IV; means “tears”)
• eyesore (The Taming of the Shrew)
• fanged (Hamlet, first attestation)
• farmhouse (The Merry Wives of Windsor; first known use of the compound)
• far-off (several, seems already familiar)
• fashionable (Timon of Athens / Troilus and Cressida)
• fathomless (not today’s sense) (Troilus and Cressida)
• fitful (Macbeth)
• fixture (not current sense) (Merry Wives of Windsor / Winter’s Tale)
• flawed (King Lear; first use as an adjective)
• flowery (A Midsummer Night’s Dream)
• foppish (King Lear)
• fortune-teller (The Comedy of Errors)
• to forward (I Henry IV; first use as a verb)
• foul-mouthed (several, seems already familiar)
• freezing (Cymbeline)
• frugal (several; “frugality” was already in common use)
• full-grown (Pericles)
• gallantry (Troilus and Cressida)
• generous (several, obviously already known)
• gloomy (several, “to gloom” was a verb)
• glow (several; the word had originally meant red-and-warm)
• gnarled (Measure for Measure; alteration of knurled which was a standard word for bumpy)
• go-between (several, seems familiar)
• to gossip (The Comedy of Errors; first use as a verb; “gossip” was one’s familiar friends)
• gust (III Henry VI, seems already familiar and was an Old Norse word)
• half-blooded (King Lear)
• hint (Othello, first use in today’s sense)
• hob-nails (I Henry IV, alleged; seems already familiar)
• hobnob (Twelfth Night; older term was “hab, nab”, and not in today’s sense)
• homely (several, seems already familiar)
• honey-tongued (Love’s Labour’s Lost)
• hoodwinked (already known from falconry)
• hostile (several, seems like a word that is already familiar)
• hot-blooded (The Merry Wives of Windsor / King Lear)
• housekeeping (The Taming of the Shrew; seems unlikely)
• howl (several, clearly familiar)
• to humor (Love’s Labour’s Lost, first attestation as a verb)
• hunchbacked (can’t find)
• to hurry (Comedy of Errors, first attestation as verb)
• ill-tempered (can’t find)
• immediacy (King Lear, first use as noun)
• impartial (2 Henry IV)
• to impede (Macbeth, first use as verb, though “impediment” was already widely used)
• import (several, and not used in the modern sense)
• immediacy (King Lear, first attestation as a noun)
• importantly (Cymbeline, first attestation as an adverb)
• inaudible (All’s Well that Ends Well; “audible” was already in use)
• inauspicious (Romeo and Juliet)
• indistinguishable (not in today’s sense)(Troilus and Cressida)
• inducement (several, seems unlikely)
• investment (II Henry IV, not in present sense)
• invitation (The Merry Wives of Windsor; signifies “flirting”)
• invulnerable King John / Hamlet / The Tempest; first attestation for the negative; Coriolanus has unvulnerable)
• jaded (several, seems already a term of contempt)
• Judgement Day (I Henry VI; usual term had been “Day of Judgement”)
• juiced (Merry Wives of Windsor; first attestation as an adjective)
• kissing (several, first attestation of the participle, though surely not its first use)
• lackluster (As You Like It)
• ladybird (Romeo and Juliet)
• to lament (several, seems already familiare)
• to lapse (several, first attestation as a verb, though already familiar as a noun)
• to launder (first use as a verb; “laundress” was in common use)
• laughable (The Merchant of Venice)
• leaky (Antony and Cleopatra / The Tempest)
• leapfrog (Henry V; first attestation but seems unlikely as a coinage)
• lonely (several, seems unlikely)
• long-legged (can’t find)
• love letter (can’t find)
• to lower (several, seems already known)
• luggage (first use as noun)
• lustrous (Twelfth Night / All’s Well that Ends Well)
• madcap (several, attestation as adjective; the noun had become popular just before)
• majestic (several, first use as adjective)
• majestically (I Henry IV; first attestation as adverb)
• malignancy (Twelfth Night, seems possible)
• manager (Love’s Labour’s Lost / Midsummer Night’s Dream; first attestation as noun)
• marketable (As You Like It; first use as adjective)
• militarist (All’s Well that Ends Well)
• mimic (Midsummer Night’s Dream)
• misgiving (Julius Caesar; first use as noun, though “to misgive” was in common use)
• misplaced (several, seems unlikely)
• to misquote (1 Henry IV; not in the present sense)
• money’s worth (Love’s Labours Lost)
• monumental (several, seems unlikely)
• moonbeam (A Midsummer Night’s Dream)
• mortifying (Merchant of Venice / Much Ado About Nothing
  )
• motionless (Henry V)
• mountaineer (Cymbeline; the sense is “hillbilly”)
• multitudinous (Macbeth)
• neglect (several, obviously already known)
• to negotiate (Much Ado about Nothing / Twelfth Night; verb from the Latin)
• new-fallen (Venus and Adonis / I Henry IV)
• new-fangled (Love’s Labour’s Lost / As You Like It)
• nimble-footed (several, seems already a familiar expression)
• noiseless (King Lear / All’s Well that Ends Well)
• to numb (King Lear, first attestation as a transitive verb)
• obscene (several; straight from Latin)
• obsequiously (first use of the adverb; comes from “obsequies”, or funeral rites)
• outbreak (Hamlet, first attestation as a noun)
• to outdare (I Henry IV)
• to outgrow (can’t find)
• to outweigh (can’t find)
• over-cool (II Henry IV)
• overgrowth (can’t find)
• over-ripened (II Henry VI ;first-use of the familiar compound)
• over-weathered The Merchant of Venice)
• overview (can’t find)
• pageantry (Pericles Prince of Tyre)
• pale-faced (A Midsummer Night’s Dream)
• to pander (several; was already a proverb)
• pedant (several, seems already in common use for a stuffy teacher)
• perplex (King John / Cymbeline)
• perusal (Sonnets / Hamlet; first use as a noun)
• to petition (Antony and Cleopatra / Coriolanus; first use as a verb)
• pious (several, seems very unlikely)
• posture (several, seems known)
• premeditated (several; first attestation of the adjective, though the noun was in use)
• priceless (???)
• Promethean (Othello / Love’s Labour’s Lost)
• protester (not today’s sense) (Julius Caesar)
• published (2 Henry VI)
• puking (As You Like It)
• puppy-dog (King John / Henry V)
• on purpose (several; seems very unlikely)
• quarrelsome (As You Like It / Taming of the Shrew)
• questing (As You Like It; first use of the gerund)
• in question (several, seems already in use)
• radiance (several; first use as noun)
• to rant (The Merry Wives of Windsor / Hamlet; loan-word from Dutch or previously-unattested English word?)
• rancorous (2 Henry VI, Comedy of Errors, Richard III, all early plays, seems unlikely)
• raw-boned (I Henry VI)
• reclusive (Much Ado about Nothing; first use as adjective)
• reinforcement (Troilus and Cressida / Coriolanus; seems already in use)
• reliance (???)
• remorseless (several, first attestation of this form)
• reprieve (several, obviously already in use)
• resolve (several, obviously already in use)
• restoration (King Lear)
• restraint (several, seems already familiar)
• retirement (II Henry IV; refers to military retreat; first use as noun)
• revolting (several, obviously already familiar)
• to rival (King Lear; first attestation as verb; noun was well-known)
• rival (Midsummer Night’s Dream; first attestation as adjective, noun was well-known)
• roadway (II Henry IV; first attestation of the compound)
• rumination (As You Like It; first use as noun)
• sacrificial (Timon of Athens; not today’s usage)
• sanctimonious (Measure for Measure / Tempest)
• satisfying (Othello / Cymbeline)
• savage (several; the word was obviously already in use)
• savagery (King John / Henry V; first use as this form)
• schoolboy (Julius Caesar / Much Ado about Nothing)
• scrubbed (The Merchant of Venice)
• scuffle (Antony and Cleopatra; first use as noun, though the verb was familiar)
• seamy-side (Othello)
• to secure (II Henry VI; first use as a verb; the adjective was well-known)
• shipwrecked (Pericles Prince of Tyre, seems unlikely)
• shooting star (Richard II; first known use of the phrase)
• shudder (Timon of Athens; first use as a noun; verb already well-known)
• silk (alleged; obviously not Shakespeare’s)
• stocking (obviously not Shakespeare’s)
• silliness (Othello)
• skim milk (I Henry IV; first use of the familiar term)
• to sneak (Measure for Measure; supposed first use of the verb)
• soft-hearted (2 Henry VI / 3 Henry VI; first use of the familiar phrase)
• spectacled (Coriolanus; not in today’s sense)
• splitting (II Henry VI; first use as adjective)
• sportive (Richard III / Comedy of Errors / All’s Well that Ends Well; supposed first use)
• to squabble (Othello; supposed first use, as with “to swagger”)
• stealthy (Macbeth; first use as adjective)
• stillborn (can’t find, obviously not Shakespeare’s)
• to submerge (Antony and Cleopatra)
• successful (Titus Andronicus, seems dubious)
• suffocating (Othello; supposed first use as a descriptor)
• to sully (I Henry VI)
• superscript (Love’s Labour’s Lost)
• to supervise (Love’s Labour’s Lost; also Hamlet but not in today’s sense)
• to swagger (II Henry IV, others; in context this seems to be already a well-known word)
• switch (first use to mean “twig”)
• tardily (All’s Well that Ends Well; first use of adverb)
• tardiness (King Lear; “tardy” as adjective was well-known)
• threateningly (All’s Well that Ends Well; first use of the adverb)
• tightly (The Merry Wives of Windsor; first use as an adverb)
• time-honored (Richard II)
• title page (can’t find; seems unlikely)
• to torture (several; first use as a verb)
• traditional (Richard III; first use as adjective)
• tranquil (Othello; “tranquility” was an old word)
• transcendence (All’s Well that Ends Well; first attestation of the noun)
• tongue-tied (III Henry VI / Julius Caesar / Troilus and Cressida; seems first attestation of a phrase already in use)
• unaccommodated (King Lear)
• unaware (Venus and Adonis; first use as an adverb; the adjective was not yet in use)
• to unclog (Coriolanus, first use as a negative)
• unappeased (Titus Andronicus)
• unchanging (The Merchant of Venice)
• unclaimed (As You Like It; not in today’s sense)
• uncomfortable (Romeo and Juliet)
• to uncurl (???)
• to undervalue (The Merchant of Venice)
• to undress (The Taming of the Shrew; seems unlikely)
• unearthly (Winter’s Tale)
• uneducated (Love’s Labour’s Lost, seems possible)
• ungoverned (Richard III / King Lear)
• to unhand (Hamlet)
• unmitigated (Much Ado about Nothing)
• unpublished (King Lear; in the sense of “still unknown”)
• unreal (Macbeth, first use of the negative)
• unsolicited (Titus Andronicus / Henry VIII; supposed first use of the form)
• unswayed (Richard III; not in today’s sense, but “is the sword unswung?”)
• unwillingness (Richard III / Richard II)
• upstairs (I Henry IV; supposedly first use as an adjective)
• urging (Richard III / Comedy of Errors; first attestation as a noun
• useful (several, seems already familiar)
• varied (Love’s Labour’s Lost, others)
• vastly (Rape of Lucrece, not present sense)
• viewless (Measure for Measure; means “invisible”)
• vulnerable (Macbeth; used in today’s sense)
• watchdog (The Tempest; first use of the phrase)
• well-behaved (The Merry Wives of Windsor; first known use of the compound)
• well-bred (II Henry IV; first use of the familiar compound)
• well-read (I Henry IV)
• whirligig (Twelfth Night)
• to widen (???)
• widowed (Sonnet 97 / Coriolanus; first use as an adjective)
• worn out (Romeo and Juliet / 2 Henry IV; seems unlikely)
• worthless (III Henry VI, several others; seems just a first attestation)
• yelping (I Henry VI; first attestation of this adjectival form)
• zany (Love’s Labour Lost; simply a loan-word from Italian commedia dell’arte)

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