authority
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
9 characters
Language
English
word origin
Source
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "authority", 9-letters, with pronunciation in International Phonetic Alphabet notation, etymology traced through Germanic and Romance roots where applicable, common misspelling variants catalogued from Hunspell error dictionaries, and usage frequency ranked against the top 100,000 English words in the Wordfreq corpus. PlainSpell covers English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German spelling with confusable-pair detection that highlights visually and phonetically similar words. This entry for "authority" includes synonyms, antonyms, homophones, and cross-language translation pointers sourced from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org extract. Whether you are verifying the correct spelling of "authority" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
authority is aEnglishnoun. It means: Power or right to make or enforce rules, give orders, or impose obligation; or a position having such power or right. Pronounced /ɔːˈθɒɹəti/. It ranks #1,625 in English word frequency. Often confused with authorize and authorise.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | authority |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ɔːˈθɒɹəti/ |
| Letters | 9 |
| Frequency rank | #1,625 |
| Misspellings tracked | 13 |
| Confusable pairs | 2 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for authority is 9 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ɔːˈθɒɹəti/. Corpus data places it at rank #1,625 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 6 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 13 documented wrong-spelling variants for authority, with forms such as "atuhority", "auhtority", and "authhority". Each variant represents a distinct typo pattern that appears often enough in corpora to be worth flagging, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution.It also participates in 2 confusable-pair relationships, "authorize", "authorise", where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *h₂weg- Proto-Indo-European *h₂ewg-der. Proto-Italic *augeō Latin augeō Proto-Indo-European *-tōr Proto-Italic *-tōr Latin -tor Latin auctor Proto-Indo-European *-teh₂ Proto-Indo-European *-ts Proto-Indo-European *-teh₂ts … Root origin matters for spelling because borrowed morphemes (Greek, Latin, Old French, Old English) carry their source-language orthographic conventions into modern English, which is why historical etymology is often the cleanest predictor of whether a cluster like "-ough", "-eau", or "-tion" will appear. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct English form is authority, spelled A-U-T-H-O-R-I-T-Y, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1Power or right to make or enforce rules, give orders, or impose obligation; or a position having such power or right.
- 2Persons, regarded collectively, who occupy official positions of power; police or law enforcement.
- 3A reliable, definitive source of information on a subject.
- 4Status as a trustworthy source of information, reputation for mastery or expertise; or claim to such status or reputation.
- 5Official permission; authorisation to act in some capacity on behalf of a ruling entity.
- 6A government-owned agency that runs a revenue-generating activity for public benefit.
Etymology
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *h₂weg- Proto-Indo-European *h₂ewg-der. Proto-Italic *augeō Latin augeō Proto-Indo-European *-tōr Proto-Italic *-tōr Latin -tor Latin auctor Proto-Indo-European *-teh₂ Proto-Indo-European *-ts Proto-Indo-European *-teh₂ts Proto-Italic *-tāts Latin -tās Latin auctōritāsbor. Old French autoritébor. Middle English auctorite English authority From Middle English auctorite, autorite (“authority, book or quotation that settles an argument”), from Old French auctorité, from Latin stem of auctōritās (“invention, advice, opinion, influence, command”), from auctor (“master, leader, author”). For the presence of the h, compare the etymology of author.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: atuhority,auhtority,authhority,authoirty,authoritty,authorityy,authoriyt,authorrity,authortiy,authroity,autohrity,autthority,uathority
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for authority
Misspelling Variants of "authority"
Frequency rank: #1,625 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter A in our English index: