gossamer
/ˈɡɒ.sə.mə/
"gossamer" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“gossamer” is an uncommon English word, ranked #56,777 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #56,777
- frequency rank, English
- 8
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A fine film made up of cobwebs, seen floating in the air or caught on bushes, etc.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | gossamer |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈɡɒ.sə.mə/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #56,777 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “gossamer” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for gossamer is 8 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈɡɒ.sə.mə/. Corpus data places it at rank #56,777 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 3 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
gossamer doesn't appear in our generated misspelling index, a sign its spelling follows regular English conventions. This headword has no recorded confusable partner, a sign it's visually distinctive enough not to be mixed up with another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English gossomer, gosesomer, gossummer (attested since around 1300, and only in reference to webs or other light things), usually thought to derive from gos (“goose”) + somer (“summer”) and to have initially referred to a period of warm weather … The correct English form is gossamer, spelled G-O-S-S-A-M-E-R.
Definition
- 1A fine film made up of cobwebs, seen floating in the air or caught on bushes, etc.
- 2A soft, sheer fabric.
- 3Anything delicate, light and flimsy.
Etymology
From Middle English gossomer, gosesomer, gossummer (attested since around 1300, and only in reference to webs or other light things), usually thought to derive from gos (“goose”) + somer (“summer”) and to have initially referred to a period of warm weather in late autumn when geese were eaten — compare Middle Scots goesomer, goe-summer (“summery weather in late autumn; St Martin's summer”) and dialectal English go-harvest, both later connected in folk-etymology to go — and to have been transferred to cobwebs because they were frequent then or because they were likened to goose-down. Skeat says that in Craven the webs were called summer-goose, and compares Scots and dialectal English use of summer-colt in reference to "exhalations seen rising from the ground in hot weather". Weekley notes that both the webs and the weather have fantastical names in most European languages: compare German Altweibersommer (“Indian summer; cobwebs, gossamer”, literally “old wives' summer”) and other terms listed there.
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 “gossamer”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is G-O-S-S-A-M-E-R - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈɡɒ.sə.mə/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- 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.