cunctation
/kʌŋkˈteɪʃən/
"cunctation" is a 10-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“cunctation” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 10
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Delay, hesitation, procrastination.
Corpus desk
Index EN-cunctation · cunctation · English
cunctation · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 10 letters
- VOW-4 4 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.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | cunctation |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /kʌŋkˈteɪʃən/ |
| Letters | 10 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “cunctation” in English
Rare enough to double-check
cunctation is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun, transcribed /kʌŋkˈteɪʃən/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Delay, hesitation, procrastination.".
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for cunctation, suggesting the orthography follows predictable English patterns. This headword has no recorded confusable partner, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Latin cūnctātiō (“a delaying, tarrying”), from cūnctor (“linger, hesitate”). The correct English form is cunctation, spelled C-U-N-C-T-A-T-I-O-N.
Definition
- 1Delay, hesitation, procrastination.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how cunctation appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
And lest any man should think her intent was to unnestle ill neighbours, and not to aid good neighbours, or that she was readier to restore what was invaded by others than to render what was in her own hands; see if the time provided not a new occasion afterwards, when through their own division, without the intermise of strangers, her forces were again s…
The swiftest animal conjoined with a heavy body implies that common moral, festina lente; and that celerity should always be contempered with cunctation.
Etymology
From Latin cūnctātiō (“a delaying, tarrying”), from cūnctor (“linger, hesitate”).
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.