Professional Thesis Writing Service

Alliteration happens when words that start with the same sound are used close together in a phrase or sentence. The sound is usually a consonant and the words don’t have to always be right next to one another.

One of the fun features of alliteration is when it becomes a tongue twister.

Examples of Alliteration

Here are some examples:

• Come and clean your closet.
• The big bad bear attacked all the little bunnies in the forest.
• Shut the shutter before it makes you shudder.
• Go and gather the green leaves in the lawn.
• Please put your pen away and play the piano.
• Round and round she ran until she realized she was running round and round.
• Out with the only open tin of tuna.
• I had to hurry home because grandma wanted her waffles.
• The baron was busy as a bee.
• Garry gathered the garbage.
• Lazy lizards lying like lumps!
• Paula planted the petunias in the pot.
• Kim comes to cut colorful kites.
• Boil the butter and bring it by the bank.
• Orson’s owl out-performed ostriches.
• Larry’s lizard likes leaping leopards.

Examples of Alliteration in Literature

• Three grey geese in a green field grazing. Grey were the geese and green was the grazing. – Three Grey Geese by Mother Goose
• Great Aunt Nellie and Brent Bernard who watch with wild wonder at the wide window as the beautiful birds begin to bite into the bountiful birdseed. – Thank-You for the Thistle by Dorie Thurston
• Betty Botter bought some butter, but she said, this butter’s bitter; if I put it in my batter, it will make my batter bitter, but a bit of better butter will make my batter better. – Betty Botter by Carolyn Wells
• A certain young fellow named Beebee; Wished to marry a lady named Phoebe; “But,” he said. “I must see; What the minister’s fee be; Before Phoebe be Phoebe Beebee” by Mother Goose
• I need not your needles, They’re needless to me, For kneading of needles, Were needless, you see; But did my neat trousers, But need to be kneed, I then should have need of your needles indeed. – Baker’s Reply to the Needle Salesman by unknown

Alliteration Tongue Twisters

Here are examples:

• Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers. If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers, where’s the peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked?
• A good cook could cook as much cookies as a good cook who could cook cookies.
• Black bug bit a big black bear. But where is the big black bear that the big black bug bit?
• Sheep should sleep in a shed.
• I saw a saw that could out saw any other saw I ever saw.
• A big bug bit the little beetle but the little beetle bit the big bug back.
• Show Shawn Sharon’s shabby shoes.
• How much wood would a woodchuck chuck; If a woodchuck would chuck wood? A woodchuck would chuck all the wood he could chuck; If a woodchuck would chuck wood.
• Silly Sally swiftly shooed seven silly sheep. The seven silly sheep Silly Sally shooed shilly-shallied south. These sheep shouldn’t sleep in a shack.

Alliteration in Names

Here are examples of alliteration in brand names and famous people

• Chuckee Cheese’s
• Coca-Cola
• Dunkin’ Donuts
• Krispy Kreme
• Mickey Mouse
• Porky Pig
• Fred Flintstone
• Donald Duck
• Spongebob Squarepants
• Seattle Seahawks

Looking for more examples of alliteration? YourDictionary has several articles on alliteration in different types of literature. You can even learn more about how to identify alliteration and see more examples to test your skills in spotting this fun way to write.