deus-ex-machina
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
15 characters
Language
English
word origin
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "deus-ex-machina", 15-letters, with pronunciation in International Phonetic Alphabet notation, etymology traced through Germanic and Romance roots where applicable, common misspelling variants catalogued from Wiktionary, and usage frequency ranked against an open word-frequency list covering the top 100,000 English words. PlainSpell covers English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German spelling with confusable-pair detection that highlights visually and phonetically similar words. This entry for "deus-ex-machina" 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 "deus-ex-machina" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
deus ex machina is aEnglishnoun. It means: Any resolution to a story that does not pay due regard to the story's internal logic and that is so unlikely that it challenges suspension of disbelief, and presumably allows the author, director, ... Pronounced /ˌdeɪ.əs ɛks ˈmækɪnə/.
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Browse all word comparisons →| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | deus ex machina |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˌdeɪ.əs ɛks ˈmækɪnə/ |
| Letters | 15 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
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Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for deus ex machina is 15 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˌdeɪ.əs ɛks ˈmækɪnə/. It sits outside the most-frequent rank tiers, which is often why uncommon words generate more spelling variants per reader.Wiktionary records 4 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
No misspelling variants are generated for deus ex machina in our index, suggesting the orthography follows predictable English patterns.It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
Etymologically, the entry records: Unadapted borrowing from Latin deus ex māchinā (literally “god from a machine [i.e., a device, scaffolding, contrivance]”), a calque of Ancient Greek ἀπὸ μηχανῆς θεός (apò mēkhanês theós). 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 deus ex machina, spelled D-E-U-S- -E-X- -M-A-C-H-I-N-A, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1Any resolution to a story that does not pay due regard to the story's internal logic and that is so unlikely that it challenges suspension of disbelief, and presumably allows the author, director, or developer to end the story in the way that they desired.
- 2A contrived solution to a problem, relying on an agent external to the situation.
- 3A deity in Greek and Roman drama who was brought in by stage machinery to intervene in a difficult situation (i.e., to resolve a crisis, or untangle issues surrounding it, a character logically expected to do so).
- 4A machine used to bring an actor playing a god onto the stage, either up through a trapdoor or (e.g. by crane) from above.
Etymology
Unadapted borrowing from Latin deus ex māchinā (literally “god from a machine [i.e., a device, scaffolding, contrivance]”), a calque of Ancient Greek ἀπὸ μηχανῆς θεός (apò mēkhanês theós).
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter D in our English index: