black
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
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5 characters
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English
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "black", 5-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 "black" 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 "black" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
black is anEnglishadj. It means: Absorbing all light and reflecting none; dark and hueless. Pronounced /blæk/. It ranks #326 in English word frequency. Often confused with buck and blah.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | black |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adj |
| IPA | /blæk/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #326 |
| Misspellings tracked | 8 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for black is 5 letters long, classified as anadj, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /blæk/. Corpus data places it at rank #326 in overall English word frequency, putting it firmly in the everyday core of the language.Wiktionary records 22 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 8 documented wrong-spelling variants for black, with forms such as "balck", "bblack", and "blacck". 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 20 confusable-pair relationships, "buck", "blah", "bloc", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: Etymology tree Proto-Germanic *blakaz Proto-West Germanic *blak Old English blæc Middle English blak English black From Middle English blak, black, blake, from Old English blæc (“black, dark", also "ink”), from Proto-West Germanic *blak, from Proto-Germanic… 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 black, spelled B-L-A-C-K, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1Absorbing all light and reflecting none; dark and hueless.
- 2Without light.
- 3Belonging to or descended from any of various (African, Aboriginal, etc.) ethnic groups which typically have dark pigmentation of the skin. (See usage notes below.)
- 4Belonging to or descended from any of various (African, Aboriginal, etc.) ethnic groups which typically have dark pigmentation of the skin. (See usage notes below.)
- 5Designated for use by those ethnic groups (as described above).
- 6Of the spades or clubs suits.
- 7Bad; evil; ill-omened.
- 8Expressing menace or discontent; threatening; sullen.
- 9Illegitimate, illegal, or disgraced.
- 10Foul; dirty, soiled.
- 11Overcrowded.
- 12Without any cream, milk, or creamer.
- 13Of or relating to the playing pieces of a board game deemed to belong to the "black" set (in chess, the set used by the player who moves second) (often regardless of the pieces' actual colour).
- 14Said of a symbol or character that is solid, filled with color.
- 15Of or pertaining to anarchism; anarchist.
- 16Related to the Christian Democratic Union of Germany.
- 17Clandestine; relating to a political, military, or espionage operation or site, the existence or details of which is withheld from the general public.
- 18Occult; relating to something (such as mystical or magical knowledge) which is unknown to or kept secret from the general public.
- 19Protestant, often with the implication of being militantly pro-British or anti-Catholic. (Compare blackmouth ("Presbyterian").)
- 20Having one or more features (hair, fur, armour, clothes, bark, etc.) that is dark (or black).
- 21Having one or more features (hair, fur, armour, clothes, bark, etc.) that is dark (or black).
- 22Sullen and solemn; bad-tempered and unhappy.
Etymology
Etymology tree Proto-Germanic *blakaz Proto-West Germanic *blak Old English blæc Middle English blak English black From Middle English blak, black, blake, from Old English blæc (“black, dark", also "ink”), from Proto-West Germanic *blak, from Proto-Germanic *blakaz (“burnt”), possibly from Proto-Indo-European *bʰleg- (“to burn, shine”). See also Dutch blaken (“to burn”), Low German blak, black (“blackness, black paint, (black) ink”), Old High German blah (“black”); also compare Latin flagrāre (“to burn”), Ancient Greek φλόξ (phlóx, “flame”), Sanskrit भर्ग (bharga, “radiance”). Adjective sense 20 is a semantic loan from Cantonese 黑面 (hak1 min6, “to pull a long face, to scowl”).
Synonyms
Antonyms
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: balck,bblack,blacck,blackk,blakc,blcak,bllack,lback
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for black
Misspelling Variants of "black"
Frequency rank: #326 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter B in our English index: