vertigo means A sensation of whirling and loss of balance, caused by looking down from a great height or by disease affecting the inner ear. It carries an Arena rating of 1976, earned across 54 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, vertigo ranks #25 of 40,231 for Qualifying, #104 of 17,116 for Words That Escaped Their Books, #220 of 17,123 for Most Malleable Words, #279 of 17,113 for Most Elegant Words.
vertigo is pronounced /ˈvɜːtɪɡəʊ/.
Why “vertigo” is a great word
A sensation of whirling and loss of balance, often associated with looking down from a height or a disorder of the inner ear. From the Latin vertigo ('dizziness, a whirling'), from vertere ('to turn'), first attested in English in the early 15th century. Unlike 'dizziness' (a broader term for unsteadiness, lacking the distinct illusion of motion) or 'acrophobia' (a psychological fear of heights that may trigger it), vertigo is the body's specific, disorienting conviction that the stable world is actively rotating. It is the sudden lurch on a fire escape when the world begins its pirouette, the solid ground tilting like a deck in a storm, and the silent, internal gyration in a motionless room—the visceral proof that our sense of place is a fragile fiction, easily revoked.
noun
- A sensation of whirling and loss of balance, caused by looking down from a great height or by disease affecting the inner ear.
- A disordered or imbalanced state of mind or things analogous to physical vertigo; mental giddiness or dizziness.
- The act of whirling round and round; rapid rotation.
- A snail of the genus Vertigo.
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