Every word has a meaning, but over the years those meanings change. Dip into these helpfully illustrated pages and you’ll find many of the words you use every day without ever realising that their up-to-date definition is something entirely different.

Words like ‘bunny’ (rather like a bun), or ‘cherish’ (rather like a chair), ‘Cardiology’ (the study of knitwear) or ‘buggery’ (the study of insects), ‘Venezuala’ (a gondola with a harpoon) or ‘Norway’ (a Geordie exclamation of surprise), ‘ivy’ (the Roman for “four”) or ‘faculty’ (cockney for “there’s no more PG Tips”).

Thanks to The Complete Uxbridge English Dictionary you can now use familiar, everyday words in total confidence, fully appraised of their latest meanings. Happy wording!