calabash
/ˈkaləbaʃ/
"calabash" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“calabash” is uncommon English (frequency #68,905 among 5,599 “C” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #68,905
- frequency rank, English
- 5,599
- “C” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A tree (known as the calabash tree; Crescentia cujete) native to Central and South America, the West Indies, and southern Florida, bearing large, round fruit used to make containers (sense 3); the ...
Corpus desk
Index EN-calabash · calabash · English
calabash · rank #68,905 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #68,905
- LEN-LONG 8 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 5,599
- PHOTO-FINISH Bustamante
Nearest frequency peer: Bustamante (-3 rank slots)
Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
Long-tail ranks near “calabash”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- buncha
buncha
31,103 corpus weight
- Burne
Burne
31,101 corpus weight
- Bustamante
Bustamante
31,099 corpus weight
- calabash
calabash
31,096 corpus weight
- careening
careening
31,093 corpus weight
- carillon
carillon
31,091 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “calabash” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | calabash |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈkaləbaʃ/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #68,905 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “calabash” in English
Rare enough to double-check
calabash is uncommon English at frequency #68,905 among 5,599 “C” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed /ˈkaləbaʃ/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 5 senses are on record.
No misspelling variants are generated for calabash in our index, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
Etymologically, the entry records: From French calebasse, from Spanish calabaza (“gourd; pumpkin”), possibly from Arabic قَرْعَةٌ يَابِسَةٌ (qarʕatun yābisatun, “dry gourd”) or directly from its etymon Persian خربزه (xarboze, “melon”), possibly ultimately from Sanskrit त्रपुस (trapusa, “colo… The correct English form is calabash, spelled C-A-L-A-B-A-S-H.
Definition
- 1A tree (known as the calabash tree; Crescentia cujete) native to Central and South America, the West Indies, and southern Florida, bearing large, round fruit used to make containers (sense 3); the fruit of this tree.
- 2The bottle gourd (calabash vine, Lagenaria siceraria), believed to have originated in Africa, which is grown for its fruit that are used as a vegetable and to make containers (sense 3); the fruit of this plant.
- 3A container made from the mature, dried shell of the fruit of one of the above plants; also, a similarly shaped container made from some other material.
- 4A calabash and its contents; as much as fills such a container.
- 5A musical instrument, most commonly a drum or rattle, made from a calabash fruit.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how calabash appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
As we were absolutely destitute of large vessels, to contain and mix liquids, we poured, by means of a tutuma (fruit of crescentia cujete, calabash), the water of the river into one of the holes of the rock. To this we added sugar, and the juice of acid fruits. In a few minutes we had an excellent beverage, which was almost a refinement of luxury in that…
There was a teacher who taught children to read under a calabash tree, and this teacher's name was Goso.
Etymology
From French calebasse, from Spanish calabaza (“gourd; pumpkin”), possibly from Arabic قَرْعَةٌ يَابِسَةٌ (qarʕatun yābisatun, “dry gourd”) or directly from its etymon Persian خربزه (xarboze, “melon”), possibly ultimately from Sanskrit त्रपुस (trapusa, “colocynth fruit”) (compare Persian تربزه (tarboze, “watermelon”)). The English word is cognate with Catalan carabassa (“pumpkin; orange colour”), Galician cabaza (“gourd, pumpkin, squash; calabash (container)”), Occitan calebasso, carabasso, carbasso, Portuguese cabaça (“gourd; calabash (container)”), Sicilian caravazza (and caramazza).
This word in other languages
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 English corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "calabash", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 8 letters (nearest by frequency rank).