brickbats
brick·bats/ˈbɹɪkˌbæts/noun, verb
brickbats is spelled B-R-I-C-K-B-A-T-S: 9 letters and 2 syllables (brick·bats). It appears about once in every 23 million words in written English, the 146,811th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, brickbats means “Small rocky particles moving as a group in space, especially as forming rings around planets” (English Wiktionary, September 2026).
How many letters and syllables are in brickbats?
| Letters | 9: B-R-I-C-K-B-A-T-S |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 2: brick·bats |
| In writing | about once in every 23 million words; the 146,811th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How common is brickbats?
Brickbats appears about once in every 23 million words in written English, the 146,811th most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How do you pronounce brickbats?
- UK /ˈbɹɪkbæts/
- US /ˈbɹɪkˌbæts/
Brickbats has 2 syllables, split brick·bats in writing.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does brickbats mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
informalSmall rocky particles moving as a group in space, especially as forming rings around planets.
- 2
plural of brickbat
verb
- 1
third-person singular simple present indicative of brickbat
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Where does brickbats come from?
From brickbat + -s. The plural only sense (“small rocky particles moving as a group in space”) was coined by the Scottish physicist James Clerk Maxwell (1831–1879) and is used chiefly in reference to his writings.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).