cretin
/ˈkɹɛtɪn/
"cretin" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“cretin” is an uncommon English word, ranked #56,034 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #56,034
- frequency rank, English
- 6
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A person who fails to develop mentally and physically due to a congenital hypothyroidism.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | cretin |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈkɹɛtɪn/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #56,034 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “cretin” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for cretin is 6 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈkɹɛtɪn/. Corpus data places it at rank #56,034 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 2 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
No misspelling variants are generated for cretin in our index, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. No close-neighbour confusable shows up for this headword in our dataset, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: From French crétin (“cretin, idiot”), likely from crestin, an Alpine dialectal form of chrétien, from Latin christiānus in the lost sense of “anyone in Christendom”, often with a sense of “poor fellow”. Doublet of Christian. The correct English form is cretin, spelled C-R-E-T-I-N.
Definition
- 1A person who fails to develop mentally and physically due to a congenital hypothyroidism.
- 2An idiot.
Etymology
From French crétin (“cretin, idiot”), likely from crestin, an Alpine dialectal form of chrétien, from Latin christiānus in the lost sense of “anyone in Christendom”, often with a sense of “poor fellow”. Doublet of Christian.
This word in other languages
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 English corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Using “cretin”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is C-R-E-T-I-N - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈkɹɛtɪn/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.