goitre
/ˈɡɔɪ.tɚ/noun
goitre is a noun meaning “An enlargement of the front and sides of the neck caused by inflammation of the thyroid gland” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled G-O-I-T-R-E and has 2 syllables, and it appears about once in every 22 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of goitre is goitres.
What does goitre mean?
noun
- 1
UKAn enlargement of the front and sides of the neck caused by inflammation of the thyroid gland.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce goitre?
- UK /ˈɡɔɪ.tə/
- US /ˈɡɔɪ.tɚ/
Goitre has 2 syllables (counted from the pronunciation).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Flame,_not_lame-goitre.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of goitre
- goitres plural
- goiter
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is goitre?
Goitre appears about once in every 22 million words in written English, the 141,699th 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).
Goitre in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense enlargement of the neck:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | goitre |
| German | Kropf, Struma, Satthals |
| Portuguese | bócio, escrófulas, papeira |
| Spanish | bocio, coto, güecho, güegüecho |
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 goitre come from?
Borrowed from French, either from Old French goitron (“throat, neck, goitre”), itself from Vulgar Latin *gutturiō, *gutturiōnem (“throat, goitre-like protrusions”), from Latin guttur, or a back-formation from French goitreux (“goitered”).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).