companion
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
9 characters
Language
English
word origin
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "companion", 9-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 "companion" 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 "companion" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
companion is aEnglishnoun. It means: A friend, acquaintance, or partner; someone with whom one spends time or accompanies Pronounced /kəmˈpæn.jən/. It ranks #5,772 in English word frequency. Often confused with comparison and compassion.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | companion |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /kəmˈpæn.jən/ |
| Letters | 9 |
| Frequency rank | #5,772 |
| Misspellings tracked | 13 |
| Confusable pairs | 5 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for companion is 9 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /kəmˈpæn.jən/. Corpus data places it at rank #5,772 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 10 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 13 documented wrong-spelling variants for companion, with forms such as "ccompanion", "cmopanion", and "comapnion". 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 5 confusable-pair relationships, "comparison", "compassion", "companions", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English companion, from Old French compaignon (“companion”) (modern French compagnon), from Late Latin compāniōn- (nominative singular compāniō, whence French copain), from com- + pānis (literally, with + bread), a word first attested in the Fra… 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 companion, spelled C-O-M-P-A-N-I-O-N, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1A friend, acquaintance, or partner; someone with whom one spends time or accompanies
- 2A person employed to accompany or travel with another.
- 3The framework on the quarterdeck of a sailing ship through which daylight entered the cabins below.
- 4The covering of a hatchway on an upper deck which leads to the companionway; the stairs themselves.
- 5A knot in whose neighborhood another, specified knot meets every meridian disk.
- 6A thing or phenomenon that is closely associated with another thing, phenomenon, or person.
- 7An appended source of media or information, designed to be used in conjunction with and to enhance the main material.
- 8A celestial object that is associated with another.
- 9A knight of the lowest rank in certain orders.
- 10A fellow; a rogue.
Etymology
From Middle English companion, from Old French compaignon (“companion”) (modern French compagnon), from Late Latin compāniōn- (nominative singular compāniō, whence French copain), from com- + pānis (literally, with + bread), a word first attested in the Frankish Lex Salica as a calque of a Germanic word, probably Frankish *galaibo, *gahlaibō (“messmate”, literally “with-bread”), from Proto-Germanic *gahlaibô. Compare also Old High German galeipo (“messmate”) and Gothic 𐌲𐌰𐌷𐌻𐌰𐌹𐌱𐌰 (gahlaiba, “messmate”); and, for the semantics, compare Old Armenian ընկեր (ənker, “friend”, literally “messmate”). More at co-, loaf. Displaced native Old English ġefēra (literally “fellow traveler”). Compare company and mate.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: ccompanion,cmopanion,comapnion,commpanion,compainon,companino,companionn,compannion,companoin,compnaion,comppanion,copmanion,ocmpanion
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for companion
Misspelling Variants of "companion"
Frequency rank: #5,772 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter C in our English index: