Shakespeare Vocabulary List
1. Bard (noun) - A professional poet and singer. This term originated with the ancient Celtic
civilization.
2. Blank Verse (noun) - Poetry written in regular metrical but unrhymed lines, almost always
iambic pentameters.
3. Collaboration (noun) - An item which was completed with several people working together.
4. Contemporary (noun) - Someone or something from the same time period as something else.
5. Critique (verb) - To review something. (This word can also be used as a noun.)
6. Doge (noun) - An Italian word for a Duke.
7. Extant (adj.) - Something still in existence, not having disappeared.
8. Folio (noun) - A book or a manuscript. (Specifically one made by folding sheets of paper.)
9. Genre (noun) - A stylistic category, especially of literature or other artworks.
10. Iambic Pentameter (noun) - A commonly used type of metrical line in traditional poetry.
The term describes the rhythm that the words establish in that line, which is measured in small
groups of syllables called "feet". An iamb is an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed
syllable.
11. Moor (noun) - Historically, an Islamic person of Arab or Berber origin residing in North
Africa.
12. Renaissance (noun) - A period of revival of art, architecture, literature and learning. (The
Renaissance as a time period refers to specific parts of Europe between the 14th and 17th
centuries.)
13. Sonnet (noun) - A fixed verse form of Italian origin consisting of fourteen lines that are
typically five-foot iambics and rhyme according to a few selected schemes.
14. Stanza (noun) - A unit of a poem, written or printed as a paragraph.
15. Thane (noun) - An Old English term for an aristocrat, or a retainer of a king.
16. Vogue (noun) - The prevailing fashion or style.