descry
/dɪˈskɹaɪ/verb
descry is spelled D-E-S-C-R-Y: 6 letters and 2 syllables. It appears about once in every 48 million words in written English, the 214,628th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a verb, descry means “To announce a discovery: to disclose; to reveal” (English Wiktionary, September 2026).
How many letters and syllables are in descry?
| Letters | 6: D-E-S-C-R-Y |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 2 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | about once in every 48 million words; the 214,628th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How common is descry?
Descry appears about once in every 48 million words in written English, the 214,628th most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How do you pronounce descry?
- /dɪˈskɹaɪ/
Descry has 2 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-descry.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of descry
- descries present, singular, he/she/it
- descrying participle, present
- descried participle, past
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does descry mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
verb
- 1
To announce a discovery: to disclose; to reveal.
- 2
To see, especially from afar; to discover (a distant or obscure object) by the eye; to espy; to discern or detect.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Descry in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense to discover; to detect:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | percevoir |
| German | wahrnehmen, erkennen, entdecken, herauslesen |
| Spanish | divisar |
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does descry come from?
From Middle English descrien, descriven in the 14th century already had the dual sense of "to proclaim, announce, make known" and "to see, discern, discover". On the one hand, the Middle English word is a loan Old French descrier (“to proclaim, announce, cry”), from des- + crier (“shout, cry”); in this case, the word is a doublet of decry, which was loaned from the same French source in the 17th century.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).