footman
"footman" is a 7-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“footman” is an uncommon English word, ranked #52,952 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #52,952
- frequency rank, English
- 7
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A soldier who marches and fights on foot; a foot soldier.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | footman |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #52,952 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “footman” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for footman is 7 letters long, classified as a noun. Corpus data places it at rank #52,952 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 7 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
No misspelling variants are generated for footman in our index, since its letter sequence doesn't invite the usual edit-distance slips. Our dataset records no confusable match here, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English fotman, footman, foteman (“foot soldier, running footman”), from Old English *fōtman, *fōtmann (attested only as Old English fēþman, fēþemann (“footman”), equivalent to foot + man. The correct English form is footman, spelled F-O-O-T-M-A-N.
Definition
- 1A soldier who marches and fights on foot; a foot soldier.
- 2A man in waiting; a male servant whose duties are to attend the door, the carriage, the table, etc.
- 3A servant who runs in front of his master's carriage.
- 4A metallic stand with four feet, for keeping anything warm before a fire.
- 5A moth of the family Arctiidae (or subfamily Arctiinae); -- so called from its livery-like colors.
- 6A moth of the family Arctiidae (or subfamily Arctiinae); -- so called from its livery-like colors.
- 7A bar that connects the treadle of a spinning wheel to the wheel.
Etymology
From Middle English fotman, footman, foteman (“foot soldier, running footman”), from Old English *fōtman, *fōtmann (attested only as Old English fēþman, fēþemann (“footman”), equivalent to foot + man.
Synonyms
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); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 English corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Using “footman”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is F-O-O-T-M-A-N - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.