caliginous
/kəˈlɪdʒɪnəs/
"caliginous" is a 10-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“caliginous” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as an adjective. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 10
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Dark, obscure; murky.
Corpus desk
Index EN-caliginous · caliginous · English
caliginous · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 10 letters
- VOW-5 5 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "C" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
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.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | caliginous |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /kəˈlɪdʒɪnəs/ |
| Letters | 10 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “caliginous” in English
Rare enough to double-check
caliginous is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anadjective, transcribed /kəˈlɪdʒɪnəs/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Dark, obscure; murky.".
caliginous has no tracked misspelling variants, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, suggesting its spelling stands apart enough that readers rarely confuse it with something else.
Etymologically, the entry records: Borrowed from Middle French caligineux (“misty; obscure”), or directly from its Latin etymon cālīginōsus (“misty; dark, obscure”). Cālīginōsus is derived from cālīgō, cālīginis (“fog, mist, vapour; darkness, gloom”)) + -ōsus (suffix meaning ‘full of, prone … The correct English form is caliginous, spelled C-A-L-I-G-I-N-O-U-S.
Definition
- 1Dark, obscure; murky.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how caliginous appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Hierapolis is ſeated over-againſt Laodicea, where are to be ſeen baths of hot waters, and the Plutonium. [...] The Plutonium is under the brow of the hill, the entrance into which is no wider than that a man can thruſt himſelf through; yet it is very deep within, of a quadrangular form, containing about the compaſs of half an acre, and is filled with ſuch…
By the time breakfast was announced, the land had faded into a thin caliginous streak; and, except passing a huge unwieldy Chinese junk, which lay at anchor, though her lateen sails were hoisted, nothing worthy of note occurred during the day.
Etymology
Borrowed from Middle French caligineux (“misty; obscure”), or directly from its Latin etymon cālīginōsus (“misty; dark, obscure”). Cālīginōsus is derived from cālīgō, cālīginis (“fog, mist, vapour; darkness, gloom”)) + -ōsus (suffix meaning ‘full of, prone to’ forming adjectives from nouns).
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.