besides orange, which words do not rhyme with anything?

Answer 1

silver and month

Answer 2

Purple

Answer 3

A lot of myths about this, esp. the idea that only a few words qualify.

In fact, by the definition used to say "orange" has no rhyme, there are MANY English words that have no rhyme, and the longer the words are, the more non-rhyming ones you find.

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The question is obviously referring to "PERFECT rhyme" (more on that in a moment). If you allow any other type of rhyme, including ones that allow a few sounds that are close but not exact matches you can find a "near rhyme" for virtually ANY English word, INCLUDING "orange" and "silver".

So for the question "are there are any English words with which no other words rhyme?" the simple answer is:

There are just a handful of ONE -syllable words that have none --I know of five (listed below)-- BUT when you look at longer words whose main stress is further from the end of the word there are MANY more (I list just a handful of them below).
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To clarify, here is a definition of "perfect rhyme":

"Rhyme in which the final accented vowel and all succeeding consonants or syllables are identical, while the preceding consonants are different, for example, great, late; rider, beside her; dutiful, unbeautiful. Also called full rhyme, true rhyme."
http://www.bartleby.com/61/83/P0188300.h...

Understanding this, the the accent is from the end of the word the more sounds there are that have to be exactly matched. Thus, there are an ENORMOUS number of English words with the accent at least three syllables from the end for which there is no perfect rhyme.

As a practical matter, you can usually find excellent 'near rhymes' for these words, in which MOST of the sounds are the same, and poems use these quite effectively all the time.

For example: "discombobulate" has no perfect rhyme, but "populate" and "ovulate" are good near rhymes, since they differ only slightly in one consonant in the middle. (Note that p and v are close to b in sound; 'inoculate' would not be quite as good since its /k/ sound is not as close to the /b/sound.)

So, the discussion ought really to focus on words with one or two syllables. There are only a few of the first... a great many of the second.

Of these, the most commonly mentioned as having no rhymes are the color-words orange, purple, silver. In fact, there appear to be rhymes for the last two (hirple and chilver), though some may dismiss them as only existing in some dialects, not in "standard English". "Orange" should probably still be considered as non-rhyming since the only reasonable suggestions for rhymes are "door 'inge" ("door hinge" as pronounced in certain dialects) and "sporange". But according to the Oxford English Dictionary (often considered THE authority), the only pronunciation for this word is spuh-RANJ (with the accent on the SECOND syllable), which does NOT rhyme with English "orange" (accent on the FIRST syllable).

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One syllable words -- there are only a few one-syllable words with no rhymes (though you may include "orange" for those who pronounce it as "ornj"). This list may not be complete, but it should be close:

kiln (if the n is pronounced)
month
oink
pint
valve
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Two-syllable words with the accent on the first syllable. (If the accent is on the last syllable you only need to match the very end of the word, and this is very much like finding rhymes for one-syllable words. . . simple.)

The list of well over 200 words below is just something I threw together in no orderly way, so it is VERY incomplete. Though I believe none of these can be exactly rhymed in "standard American English", I cannot vouch for every one of them.

Also, some words may rhyme in one dialect but not another -- I've stuck with more "standard" dialects. And finally, I'm not including words that could be made up "ad hoc" from existing words, not proper names (which are so odd you'll find one that rhymes with almost anything it seems!

So here's my little starter collection:

absence, absent, accent, access, actress, advent, ancient, android,angry, anklet, aphid, arid, aspect, aspen, aspirin, astral, auction, auger, auspice, autumn, avid, awesome, awkward, axle
badger, bankrupt, basic, bastard, bottom, brackish, braless, brutish,budget, bugler, bungler, butcher
campus, capsule, carbine, carpal, cashless, childish, children, chimney, chintzy, comfort, compass, concert, conference, conga, convent, cordless, coporate, country, courage, cowboy, crimson, cruelty, cudgel, culprit
damsel, decal, different, difference, digest, dirndl, dolphin, drainage, drainboard, dreadnought, ducal
earthy, empress, empty, entrance, envy, equine, errand, ethics, exit, export, extra
fascist, faucet, featured, filming, fiscal, fitful, fixate, flimsy, foible, foppish, fortune, freshness, fruitful, furor
gadget, gangster, gargle, globule, grommet
happen, hapless, harness, harshness, harvest, headache, hermit,hopeless, hospice, hubris, hungry
igloo, import, infant, influx, inkpot, inlet, input, instance, instant,insult, irksome
jackass, jaundice, justice
larva, leprous, limit, limpid, listener, lively, livestock, luckless, luggage, luscious, lustrous
market, matchless, medic, merchant, message, milner, mistress, monster, morphine, music
nephron, nimbus, nonsense, nordic
oafish, object, office, offspring, olive, opera, orange, orbit,orchid, osprey, ostrich, oval
patience, peerage, perfect, perfume, pervert, picnic, piston, pixel, pizza, plankton, poison, postage, posture, potent, portent, pressure, pretext, program, promise, pueblo, publish, pungent, punish, purchase, putrid
rascal, reflux, reject, research, rhythm, rodent, roughage, rubric
salve, satchel, sausage, secret, seepage, sequin, sergeant, serpent, shameful, sinful, sixty, slippage, smugness, snorkel, sofa, starchy, strychnine,subject, substance, suffrage
tangent, temptress, tipster, tonnage, tonsils, torpid, traipsing,transient, transit, treacle, tubule
uncial, uncle, unctuous, urchin, useful, useless
vengeance, vineyard, virile, vulgar
wallet, warble, warp, wasp, wastrel, watchful, wicked, winsome, wintry, wishful, wordless

Answer 4

Silver, purple, month, sixth, depth, angry, elephant, pizza.

Answer 5

figure i guess