constitution
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
12 characters
Language
English
word origin
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "constitution", 12-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 "constitution" 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 "constitution" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
constitution is aEnglishnoun. It means: The act, or process of setting something up, or establishing something; the composition or structure of such a thing; its makeup. Pronounced /ˌkɒn.stɪˈtjuː.ʃ(ə)n/. It ranks #2,661 in English word frequency. Often confused with constitutive and constitutional.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | constitution |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˌkɒn.stɪˈtjuː.ʃ(ə)n/ |
| Letters | 12 |
| Frequency rank | #2,661 |
| Misspellings tracked | 19 |
| Confusable pairs | 3 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for constitution is 12 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˌkɒn.stɪˈtjuː.ʃ(ə)n/. Corpus data places it at rank #2,661 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 6 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 19 documented wrong-spelling variants for constitution, with forms such as "cconstitution", "cnostitution", and "connstitution". 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 3 confusable-pair relationships, "constitutive", "constitutional", "constipation", where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: PIE word *ḱóm From Middle English constitucioun, constitucion (“edict, law, ordinance, regulation, rule, statute; body of laws or rules, or customs; body of fundamental principles; principle or rule (of science); creation”) from Old French constitucion (mo… 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 constitution, spelled C-O-N-S-T-I-T-U-T-I-O-N, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1The act, or process of setting something up, or establishing something; the composition or structure of such a thing; its makeup.
- 2The formal or informal system of primary principles and laws that regulates a government or other institutions.
- 3A legal document describing such a formal system.
- 4A document issued by a religious authority serving to promulgate some particular church laws or doctrines.
- 5A person's physical makeup or temperament, especially in respect of robustness.
- 6The general health of a person.
Etymology
PIE word *ḱóm From Middle English constitucioun, constitucion (“edict, law, ordinance, regulation, rule, statute; body of laws or rules, or customs; body of fundamental principles; principle or rule (of science); creation”) from Old French constitucion (modern French constitution), a learned borrowing from Latin cōnstitūtiō, cōnstitūtiōnem (“character, constitution, disposition, nature; definition; point in dispute; order, regulation; arrangement, system”), from cōnstituō (“to establish, set up; to confirm; to decide, resolve”). Equivalent to constitute + -ion.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: cconstitution,cnostitution,connstitution,consittution,consstitution,constittuion,constittution,constituiton,constitusion,constitutino,constitutionn,constitutoin,constituttion,constiuttion,consttitution,consttiution,contsitution,cosntitution,ocnstitution
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for constitution
Misspelling Variants of "constitution"
Frequency rank: #2,661 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter C in our English index: