forbode
"forbode" is a 7-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“forbode” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 7
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A forbidding, a prohibition; a command forbidding a thing.
Corpus desk
Index EN-forbode · forbode · English
forbode · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 7 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "F" 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 | forbode |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 7 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “forbode” in English
Rare enough to double-check
forbode is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "A forbidding, a prohibition; a command forbidding a thing.".
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for forbode, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. No close-neighbour confusable shows up for this headword in our dataset, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English forbode, forbod, from Old English forbod (“a forbidding, prohibition”), from Proto-Germanic *frabudą (“prohibition”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰewdʰ- (“to be awake, fully perceive”), equivalent to for- + bode. Cognate with Dutch verbod… The correct English form is forbode, spelled F-O-R-B-O-D-E.
Definition
- 1A forbidding, a prohibition; a command forbidding a thing.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how forbode appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
God's/The Lord's forbode
So Moses himself explaineth it in the words here folowing, and in v. 13. 22. 27. commandements ]or, charges: meaning prohibitions, or forbodes. For God commandeth both to eschew evil, and to doe good.
Etymology
From Middle English forbode, forbod, from Old English forbod (“a forbidding, prohibition”), from Proto-Germanic *frabudą (“prohibition”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰewdʰ- (“to be awake, fully perceive”), equivalent to for- + bode. Cognate with Dutch verbod, German Verbot, Danish forbud, Swedish förbud. More at forbid.
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.