egg of Columbus
"egg-of-columbus" is a 13-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“egg of Columbus” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 15
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A brilliant idea or discovery that seems simple after the fact.
Corpus desk
Index EN-egg-of-columbus · egg of Columbus · English
egg of Columbus · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 15 letters
- VOW-5 5 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "E" 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 | egg of Columbus |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 15 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “egg of Columbus” in English
Rare enough to double-check
egg of Columbus is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "A brilliant idea or discovery that seems simple after the fact.".
The misspelling generator found no plausible variants for egg of Columbus, suggesting the orthography follows predictable English patterns. This headword has no recorded confusable partner, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
Etymologically, the entry records: Referring to an apocryphal story in which Christopher Columbus, having been told that discovering the Americas was inevitable and no great accomplishment, challenges his critics to make an egg stand on its tip. When they give up, he does it himself by tappi… The correct English form is egg of Columbus, spelled E-G-G- -O-F- -C-O-L-U-M-B-U-S.
Definition
- 1A brilliant idea or discovery that seems simple after the fact.
Etymology
Referring to an apocryphal story in which Christopher Columbus, having been told that discovering the Americas was inevitable and no great accomplishment, challenges his critics to make an egg stand on its tip. When they give up, he does it himself by tapping the egg on the table to flatten its tip.
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). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.