fissiparous
/fɪˈsɪpəɹəs/adjective
fissiparous is an adjective meaning “Factious, tending to break into pieces” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled F-I-S-S-I-P-A-R-O-U-S, and it appears about once in every 66 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data).
What does fissiparous mean?
adjective
- 1
Factious, tending to break into pieces.
- 2
Causing division or fragmenting something.
fissiparous tendencies
- 3
Of cells that reproduce through fission, splitting into two.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce fissiparous?
- /fɪˈsɪpəɹəs/
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-fissiparous.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of fissiparous
- more fissiparous comparative
- most fissiparous superlative
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is fissiparous?
Fissiparous appears about once in every 66 million words in written English, the 255,765th 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).
Fissiparous in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | incohérent , fissurant |
| Portuguese | fissíparo |
| German | fissipar |
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 fissiparous come from?
An adaptation of New Latin fissiparus, from fissus (“split, cleft”) + pariō (“to bring forth”) by analogy with vīviparus.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).