fathom
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
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English
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "fathom", 6-letters, with pronunciation in International Phonetic Alphabet notation, etymology traced through Germanic and Romance roots where applicable, common misspelling variants catalogued from Hunspell error dictionaries, and usage frequency ranked against the top 100,000 English words in the Wordfreq corpus. PlainSpell covers English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German spelling with confusable-pair detection that highlights visually and phonetically similar words. This entry for "fathom" 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 "fathom" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
fathom is aEnglishnoun. It means: A man's armspan, generally reckoned to be six feet (about 1.8 metres). Later used to measure the depth of water, but now generally replaced by the metre outside American usage. Pronounced /ˈfað(ə)m/. Often confused with father and fandom.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | fathom |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈfað(ə)m/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #20,922 |
| Misspellings tracked | 9 |
| Confusable pairs | 2 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for fathom is 6 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈfað(ə)m/. Corpus data places it at rank #20,922 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it.Wiktionary records 8 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 9 documented wrong-spelling variants for fathom, with forms such as "afthom", "fahtom", and "fathhom". Each variant represents a distinct typo pattern that appears often enough in corpora to be worth flagging, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution.It also participates in 2 confusable-pair relationships, "father", "fandom", where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English fathome, fadom, fadme (“unit of length of about six feet; depth of six feet for nautical soundings; (loosely) cubit; ell”) [and other forms], from Old English fæþm, fæþme (“encircling or outstretched arms, bosom, embrace; envelopment; co… 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 fathom, spelled F-A-T-H-O-M, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1A man's armspan, generally reckoned to be six feet (about 1.8 metres). Later used to measure the depth of water, but now generally replaced by the metre outside American usage.
- 2A man's armspan, generally reckoned to be six feet (about 1.8 metres). Later used to measure the depth of water, but now generally replaced by the metre outside American usage.
- 3A measure of distance to shore: the nearest point to shore at which the water depth is the value quoted.
- 4An unspecified depth.
- 5Depth of insight; mental reach or scope.
- 6The act of stretching out one's arms away from the sides of the torso so that they make a straight line perpendicular to the body.
- 7Someone or something that is embraced.
- 8Control, grasp.
Etymology
From Middle English fathome, fadom, fadme (“unit of length of about six feet; depth of six feet for nautical soundings; (loosely) cubit; ell”) [and other forms], from Old English fæþm, fæþme (“encircling or outstretched arms, bosom, embrace; envelopment; control, grasp, power; fathom (unit of measurement); cubit”) [and other forms], from Proto-West Germanic *faþm (“outstretched arms, embrace; fathom (unit of measurement)”), from Proto-Germanic *faþmaz (“outstretched arms, embrace; fathom (unit of measurement)”), from Proto-Indo-European *pet-, *peth₂- (“to spread out; to fly”). Cognates * Ancient Greek πέταλος (pétalos, “broad; flat”), πετᾰ́ννῡμῐ (petắnnūmĭ, “to open; to spread out; to be dispersed or scattered”) (whence English petal) * Gothic 𐍆𐌰𐌸𐌰 (faþa, “fench; hedge”) * Latin pateō (“to extend, increase; to be accessible, attainable, open; to be exposed, vulnerable”) * Low German fadem, faem (“cubit; thread”) * Middle Dutch vadem (modern Dutch vaam, vadem (“fathom”)) * Norwegian Bokmål favn (“an embrace; a fathom”) * Old Frisian fethm (“outstretched arms”) * Old High German fadam, fadum (“cubit”) (Middle High German vade (“enclosure”), vadem, vaden, modern German Faden (“fathom; filament, thread”)) * Old Norse faþmr (Danish favn (“an embrace; a fathom”), Icelandic faðmur (“an embrace”), Swedish famn (“the arms, bosom; an embrace”)) * Old Welsh etem (“thread”)
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: afthom,fahtom,fathhom,fathmo,fathomm,fatohm,fatthom,ffathom,ftahom
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for fathom
Misspelling Variants of "fathom"
Frequency rank: #20,922 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter F in our English index: