forsake
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
7 characters
Language
English
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "forsake", 7-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 "forsake" 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 "forsake" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
forsake is aEnglishverb. It means: To abandon, to give up, to leave (permanently), to renounce (someone or something). Pronounced /fɔːˈseɪk/. Often confused with forsaken and forage.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | forsake |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /fɔːˈseɪk/ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #32,404 |
| Misspellings tracked | 10 |
| Confusable pairs | 4 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for forsake is 7 letters long, classified as averb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /fɔːˈseɪk/. Corpus data places it at rank #32,404 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it.Wiktionary records 4 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 10 documented wrong-spelling variants for forsake, with forms such as "fforsake", "foraske", and "forrsake". 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 4 confusable-pair relationships, "forsaken", "forage", "forgave", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English forsaken (“to abandon, desert, repudiate, withdraw allegiance from; to deny, reject, shun; to betray; to divorce (a spouse); to disown; to be false to (one's nature, vows, etc.); to give up, renounce, surrender; to discard; to omit; to d… 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 forsake, spelled F-O-R-S-A-K-E, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1To abandon, to give up, to leave (permanently), to renounce (someone or something).
- 2To decline or refuse (something offered).
- 3To avoid or shun (someone or something).
- 4To cause disappointment to; to be insufficient for (someone or something).
Etymology
From Middle English forsaken (“to abandon, desert, repudiate, withdraw allegiance from; to deny, reject, shun; to betray; to divorce (a spouse); to disown; to be false to (one's nature, vows, etc.); to give up, renounce, surrender; to discard; to omit; to decline, refuse, reject; to avoid, escape; to cease, desist; to evade, neglect; to contradict, refute; to depart, leave; to become detached, separate”) [and other forms], from Old English forsacan (“to oppose; to give up, renounce; to decline, refuse”), from Proto-West Germanic *frasakan (“to forsake, renounce”), from Proto-Germanic *fra- (prefix meaning ‘away, off’) + *sakaną (“to charge; to dispute”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *seh₂g- (“to seek out”)). The English word can be analysed as for- + sake, and is cognate with Saterland Frisian ferseeke (“to deny, refuse”), West Frisian fersaakje, Dutch verzaken (“to renounce, forsake”), Middle High German versachen (“to deny”), Danish forsage (“to give up”), Swedish försaka (“to be without, give up”), Norwegian forsake (“to give up, renounce”), Gothic 𐍃𐌰𐌺𐌰𐌽 (sakan, “to quarrel; to rebuke”), .
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: fforsake,foraske,forrsake,forsaek,forsakke,forskae,forssake,fosrake,frosake,ofrsake
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for forsake
Misspelling Variants of "forsake"
Frequency rank: #32,404 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter F in our English index: