crow
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
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4 characters
Language
English
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "crow", 4-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 "crow" 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 "crow" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
crow is aEnglishnoun. It means: A bird, usually black, of the genus Corvus, having a strong conical beak, with projecting bristles; it has a harsh, croaking call. Pronounced /kɹəʊ/. It ranks #9,590 in English word frequency. Often confused with CW and cry.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | crow |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /kɹəʊ/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #9,590 |
| Misspellings tracked | 6 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for crow is 4 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /kɹəʊ/. Corpus data places it at rank #9,590 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 9 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 6 documented wrong-spelling variants for crow, with forms such as "ccrow", "corw", and "croww". 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 20 confusable-pair relationships, "CW", "cry", "CRT", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English crowe, from Old English crāwe, from Proto-West Germanic *krāā, from Proto-Germanic *krēǭ (compare West Frisian krie, Dutch kraai, German Krähe), from *krēaną (“to crow”). See below. 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 crow, spelled C-R-O-W, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1A bird, usually black, of the genus Corvus, having a strong conical beak, with projecting bristles; it has a harsh, croaking call.
- 2Any of various dark-coloured nymphalid butterflies of the genus Euploea.
- 3A bar of iron with a beak, crook or claw; a bar of iron used as a lever; a crowbar.
- 4Someone who keeps watch while their associates commit a crime; a lookout.
- 5A gangplank (corvus) used by the Ancient Roman navy to board enemy ships.
- 6The mesentery of an animal.
- 7An ill-tempered and obstinate woman, or one who otherwise has features resembling the bird; a harpy.
- 8A black person.
- 9The emblem of an eagle, a sign of military rank.
Etymology
From Middle English crowe, from Old English crāwe, from Proto-West Germanic *krāā, from Proto-Germanic *krēǭ (compare West Frisian krie, Dutch kraai, German Krähe), from *krēaną (“to crow”). See below.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: ccrow,corw,croww,crrow,crwo,rcow
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for crow
Misspelling Variants of "crow"
Frequency rank: #9,590 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter C in our English index: