A palindrome is a word or phrase that reads (is spelled) the same forward as backward. This style of clever writing has been around for thousands of years, in all cultures with a written language. The English word was only recently invented in the 17th century, by the famous wordsmith Ben Jonson, who formed the word out of the Greek roots palin (“again”) and dromos (“movement, direction”). People who enjoy playing with words frequently entertain themselves and others with palindromic phrases, but most of the longer ones tend to be somewhat nonsensical, as the authors are using words mainly for their spelling rather than their meaning. Two of the most famous English palindromes are “Able was I ere I saw Elba” (incorrectly attributed to Napoleon Bonaparte) and “A man, a plan, a canal: Panama” (referring to the building of the Panama Canal between 1904-1914).

Many English words are palindromes, but most are only three or four letters long (noon, tat, bob, deed, eye) Here are some of the longer English single-word palindromes:

deified (DAY-ih-fide)
This is the past tense of the verb deify, which means “to treat [someone or something] like a god.”

rotator (ROH-tay-tor)
Generically this word means “something that rotates” but you’ll rarely see it used in that manner. However, it’s a common word in anatomy, and you may have heard of (or had problems with) your rotator cuff, which is the set of muscles and tendons in your shoulder that help control the movement of your arm.

redivider (REE-dih-VI-der)
When you redivide something, you “divide it again.” A redivider is a person or other acting agent that performs this double division. This is not a common word, but it is one of the longest true palindromes in the English language.

kayak (KI-ack)
For thousands of years, the nomadic Inuit and Eskimo hunted fish, seal, and even whale in the northern oceans in enclosed skin-covered boats just big enough for one or two people. We get our English word kayak from the Inuktituk word qajak, though these days most kayaks are made out of plastic, rubber, or fiberglass.

What’s the longest palindromic phrase you can create?