country cousin

noun

"country-cousin" is a 13-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.

The verdict

“country cousin” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

Unranked
below top-frequency English
14
letters

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - An acquaintance from the countryside, who is regarded by city dwellers as being poorly adapted for city life.

Corpus desk

Index EN-country-cousin · country cousin · English

country cousin · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
  • LEN-MEGA 14 letters
  • VOW-6 6 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.

Key facts for country cousin
PropertyValue
Headwordcountry cousin
LanguageEnglish
Part of speechNoun
Letters14
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Long-tail rank of “country cousin” in English

country cousinsits beyond the 100,000 most-frequent English words, in the long tail of technical, archaic, or otherwise rare vocabulary where spelling doubt tends to strike hardest.

Beyond rank #100,000. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

country cousin is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "An acquaintance from the countryside, who is regarded by city dwellers as being poorly adapted for city life.".

country cousin doesn't appear in our generated misspelling index, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, suggesting its spelling stands apart enough that readers rarely confuse it with something else.

No documented word history exists for this headword, so its spelling pattern is best understood through pronunciation rather than a traceable origin. The correct English form is country cousin, spelled C-O-U-N-T-R-Y- -C-O-U-S-I-N.

Definition

  1. 1
    An acquaintance from the countryside, who is regarded by city dwellers as being poorly adapted for city life.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

These source excerpts show how country cousin appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.

  1. And how like a country cousin, to come down upon a poor body in this way, without so much as a day’s notice, or asking whether she would be welcome!
  2. Special commissioners had begun, in the “metropolitan press,” to be the fashion, and the journal in question must have felt it had passed too long for a mere country cousin.

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.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "country cousin"?
"country cousin" is spelled C-O-U-N-T-R-Y- -C-O-U-S-I-N.
What does "country cousin" mean?
As a noun, "country cousin" means: An acquaintance from the countryside, who is regarded by city dwellers as being poorly adapted for city life.
What language does "country cousin" come from?
"country cousin" is a English word. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for this and other words across English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German on PlainSpell.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list