"The Economist" cites this word in its obituary of the philosopher Willard Quine:

He would have had a fondness for the quinombrom, an old word for conundrum, defined in James Howell's "Lexicon Tetraglotton" of 1660: "You will judge, perhaps, that the author hath some strange freaks, or quinombroms, in his noddle."

Worth a revival?

Bingley

your quote is, in fact, the *only citation in OED. I can't see any advantage to using this rather than conundrum, unless you were in a quandary for quaint and quirky q-words.

joe (q-less) friday

Main problem would be finding a chance to spring it. Good reprisal though to some show-offs, if you can work it in.

Good reprisal though to some show-offs, if you can work it in.

Then they would think you were quixotic.
Right, J. Clueless?

>that the author hath some strange freaks, or quinombroms, in his noddle.

And where would one find one's noddle?

And where would one find one's noddle?

Presumably on one's shoulders. That's where this one's noddle is!

Webster says:

noddle \Nod"dle\, n. [OE. nodil, nodle; perh. fr. nod, because the head is the nodding part of the body, or perh. akin to E. knot; cf. Prov. E. nod the nape of the neck.] 1. The head; -- used jocosely or contemptuously.

The American Heritage Dictionary says:

nod·dle (ndl)
n.

The head. [Middle English noddel, back of the head, perhaps from Latin ndulus, lump, knob; see nodule.]

I've heard it malaproped to "noodle" as in "use your noodle".