vorpal
/ˈvɔɹpl̩/adjective
vorpal is an adjective meaning “Sharp or deadly” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled V-O-R-P-A-L, and it appears about once in every 18 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data).
What does vorpal mean?
adjective
- 1
Sharp or deadly.
- 2
Having a special power making decapitation likely.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce vorpal?
- US /ˈvɔɹpl̩/
- UK /ˈvɔːpl̩/
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Forms of vorpal
- more vorpal comparative
- most vorpal superlative
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is vorpal?
Vorpal appears about once in every 18 million words in written English, the 128,787th most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Where does vorpal come from?
Coined by British author and scholar Lewis Carroll in the poem Jabberwocky to describe a sword, likely modeled after warp and vortex + -al.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).