bone
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
4 characters
Language
English
word origin
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "bone", 4-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 "bone" 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 "bone" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
bone is aEnglishnoun. It means: A composite material consisting largely of calcium phosphate and collagen and making up the skeleton of most vertebrates. Pronounced /bəʊn/. It ranks #3,148 in English word frequency. Often confused with boy and box.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | bone |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /bəʊn/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #3,148 |
| Misspellings tracked | 4 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for bone is 4 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /bəʊn/. Corpus data places it at rank #3,148 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 15 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 4 documented wrong-spelling variants for bone, with forms such as "bbone", "bnoe", and "boen". 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, "boy", "box", "bye", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English bon, from Old English bān (“bone, tusk; the bone of a limb”), from Proto-Germanic *bainą (“bone”), from *bainaz (“straight”), possibly from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeyh₂- (“to hit, strike, beat”). Cognate with Scots bane, been, bean, bein,… 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 bone, spelled B-O-N-E, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1A composite material consisting largely of calcium phosphate and collagen and making up the skeleton of most vertebrates.
- 2Any of the components of an endoskeleton, made of this material.
- 3A bone of a fish; a fishbone.
- 4A bonefish.
- 5One of the rigid parts of a corset that forms its frame, the boning, originally made of whalebone.
- 6One of the fragments of bone held between the fingers of the hand and rattled together to keep time to music.
- 7Anything made of bone, such as a bobbin for weaving bone lace.
- 8The framework of anything.
- 9An off-white colour, like the typical colour of bone.
- 10A dollar.
- 11The wishbone formation.
- 12An erect penis; a boner.
- 13A domino or die.
- 14A cannabis cigarette; a joint.
- 15A reward.
Etymology
From Middle English bon, from Old English bān (“bone, tusk; the bone of a limb”), from Proto-Germanic *bainą (“bone”), from *bainaz (“straight”), possibly from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeyh₂- (“to hit, strike, beat”). Cognate with Scots bane, been, bean, bein, bain (“bone”), North Frisian bian, Biin, biinj (“bone; leg”), West Frisian bien (“bone”), Dutch been (“bone; leg”), German Low German Been, Bein (“bone”), German Bein (“leg”), German Gebein (“bones”), Swedish ben (“bone; leg”), Norwegian and Icelandic bein (“bone”), Breton benañ (“to cut, hew”), Latin perfinēs (“break through, break into pieces, shatter”), Avestan 𐬠𐬫𐬈𐬥𐬙𐬈 (byente, “they fight, hit”). Related also to Old Norse beinn (“straight, right, favourable, advantageous, convenient, friendly, fair, keen”) (whence Middle English bain, bayne, bayn, beyn (“direct, prompt”), Scots bein, bien (“in good condition, pleasant, well-to-do, cosy, well-stocked, pleasant, keen”)), Icelandic beinn (“straight, direct, hospitable”), Norwegian bein (“straight, direct, easy to deal with”). See bain, bein.
Synonyms
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: bbone,bnoe,boen,obne
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for bone
Misspelling Variants of "bone"
Frequency rank: #3,148 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter B in our English index: