William Shakespeare is credited with inventing or introducing over 1,700 words that are still used in English today. He used more than 20,000 words in his plays and poems, and his works provide the first recorded use of these 1,700+ words, though some may have been in oral use before he wrote them down
. There is some debate about the exact number, with estimates ranging from around 594 words (excluding compound words) to about 1,700 or even roughly 1,000 words, depending on how "invention" is defined and whether first written use counts as invention
. Many of these words were created by Shakespeare through processes such as:
- Combining existing words
- Changing nouns into verbs or vice versa
- Adding prefixes or suffixes
- Borrowing from other languages
- Creating compounds and entirely original terms
In summary, Shakespeare is widely regarded as having invented or first recorded approximately 1,700 words in English, making him one of the most prolific wordsmiths in the language's history.
