calque
/kælk/noun, verb
calque is spelled C-A-L-Q-U-E: 6 letters and one syllable. It appears about once in every 50 million words in written English, the 220,118th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, calque means “A word or phrase in a language formed by word-for-word or morpheme-by-morpheme translation of a word in another language” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of calque is calques.
How many letters and syllables are in calque?
| Letters | 6: C-A-L-Q-U-E |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 1 |
| In writing | about once in every 50 million words; the 220,118th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
| Sounds like | |
| Same letters |
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); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.
How common is calque?
Calque appears about once in every 50 million words in written English, the 220,118th 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 calque?
- /kælk/
Calque has one syllable.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-calque.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Words people confuse with calque
Sounds like: calc, calk (Wiktionary's homophone list; some hold only in some accents).
Sources: English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).
What rhymes with calque?
No other word on PlainSpell ends in the same sounds as calque.
Spelled with the same letters in another order: claque.
Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).
Forms of calque
- calques plural, present, singular, he/she/it
- calquing participle, present
- calqued participle, past
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does calque mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
A word or phrase in a language formed by word-for-word or morpheme-by-morpheme translation of a word in another language.
verb
- 1
To adopt (a word or phrase) from one language to another by semantic translation of its parts.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Calque in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | calque , calquer |
| German | Lehnübersetzung , lehnübersetzen |
| Portuguese | decalque, decalque linguístico , decalcar |
| Spanish | calco , calcar |
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does calque come from?
From French calque (“calque”, literally “copy, tracing”), from calquer (“to copy, trace”) (whence also calk), itself borrowed from Italian calcare, from Latin calcāre (“to tread”). Doublet of calcate and calcation.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).