despotism
/ˈdɛspətɪzəm/
"despotism" is a 9-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“despotism” is an uncommon English word, ranked #55,380 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #55,380
- frequency rank, English
- 9
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Government by a despot or despots: rule by a singular authority, either a single person or a tight-knit group, which rules with absolute power, especially in a cruel and oppressive way.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | despotism |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈdɛspətɪzəm/ |
| Letters | 9 |
| Frequency rank | #55,380 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “despotism” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for despotism is 9 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈdɛspətɪzəm/. Corpus data places it at rank #55,380 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "Government by a despot or despots: rule by a singular authority, either a single person or a tight-knit group, which rules with absolute power, especially in a cruel and oppressive way.".
despotism has no tracked misspelling variants, suggesting the orthography follows predictable English patterns. Our dataset records no confusable match here, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
Etymologically, the entry records: From French despotisme; equivalent to despot + -ism. The correct English form is despotism, spelled D-E-S-P-O-T-I-S-M.
Definition
- 1Government by a despot or despots: rule by a singular authority, either a single person or a tight-knit group, which rules with absolute power, especially in a cruel and oppressive way.
Etymology
From French despotisme; equivalent to despot + -ism.
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 “despotism”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is D-E-S-P-O-T-I-S-M - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈdɛspətɪzəm/ (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.