dromedary
drom·e·da·ry/ˈdɹɒmɪdəɹi/noun
dromedary is spelled D-R-O-M-E-D-A-R-Y, 4 syllables: drom·e·da·ry. The wrong spelling people search most is dromadery: about 10 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 1 in 133 of all searches for the word. Dromedary is a noun meaning “The single-humped camel (Camelus dromedarius)”. The plural of dromedary is dromedaries.
How many letters and syllables are in dromedary?
| Letters | 9: D-R-O-M-E-D-A-R-Y |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 4: drom·e·da·ry |
| In writing | about once in every 9 million words; the 88,353rd most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | 1; the most searched, dromadery, about 10 Bing searches a month (all of them) |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026).
How do you spell dromedary?
Dromedary is spelled D-R-O-M-E-D-A-R-Y. One wrong spelling is searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 1 in 134 of the searches for dromedary in either form.
Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026). Wrong spellings are taken from Wiktionary entries tagged "misspelling" and its obsolete or nonstandard forms, Wikipedia's Lists of common misspellings and the codespell dictionary, then measured. The proofreader's marks show the change that corrects each one.
How common is dromedary?
Dromedary appears about once in every 9 million words in written English, the 88,353rd 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 dromedary?
- UK /ˈdɹɒmɪdəɹi/
- UK /ˈdrʌ-/
- UK /-mə-/
Dromedary has 4 syllables, split drom·e·da·ry in writing.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-I_learned_some_phrases-dromedary.wav, En-us-dromedary.mp3, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of dromedary
- dromedaries plural
- dromedarie
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does dromedary mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
The single-humped camel (Camelus dromedarius).
- 2
Any swift riding camel.
- 3
datedReferring to a biphasic clinical course of poliomyelitis, typically occurring in children, characterized by a minor illness, followed by an asymptomatic period of several days before the onset of a major illness involving the central nervous system.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Dromedary in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense single-humped camel:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | dromadaire |
| German | Dromedar |
| Portuguese | dromedário |
| Spanish | dromedario |
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 dromedary come from?
From Middle English dromedari, dromedarie (“dromedary; any camel”) [and other forms], from Old French dromedaire, from Late Latin dromedārius (“kind of camel”), from Latin *dromadārius, from dromas, dromadis (“dromedary”) + -ārius (suffix forming nouns denoting agents of use). Dromas and dromadis are derived from Ancient Greek δρομᾰ́ς (dromắs, “running; dromedary”), an ellipsis of δρομὰς κάμηλος (dromàs kámēlos, “running camel”), from δρόμος (drómos, “race, running; race course, track”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *drem- (“to run”).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).