What are the words that were used during Shakespeare's time that are seldom used nowadays?
I would like to write a Shakespearean poem that reads and sounds like a poem written during that time period. However, I don't know where I can find an exhaustive list of words that were used during that time with the corresponding words used today. Could someone help me out? I don't want to use some Shakespearean words and end up leaving some, because I am not aware of them. I want to go 100% Shakespearean.
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A concordance lists every word used in a work (or across a series of works) alphabetically, so the link Concordance of Shakespeare's complete works from OpenSourceShakespeare will be helpful. Clicking on a word will show you which works it was used in, and clicking on the title of the work will show you the exact quotes.
OpenSourceShakespeare also has the full text of Shakespeare's works if you want to just read.
This post was sourced from https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/42248. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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After you're done reading the sonnets, you can check your newly learned words against this reference of Common Words & Phrases in Shakespeare's World:
https://learn.lexiconic.net/shakewords.htm
A note of caution. As with any pre-compiled work that is not the direct result of your efforts, I would still recommend a bit of skepticism when approaching such a shopping list.
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