The word panjandrum has been popping up recently. I have noticed it from the pens of Andreas Whittam Smith, Andrew Graham-Dixon, Brian Sewell, Simon Hoggart and funny old Roy Greenslade.
It sounds like a proper word, one with an ancient etymology, although it is fairly widely known that it was invented in 1755 by Samuel Foote, the actor and satirist (1721–77).
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