Honshu
/ˈhɑnʃu/
"honshu" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“Honshu” is uncommon English (frequency #63,685 among 2,646 “H” headwords), classed as a proper noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #63,685
- frequency rank, English
- 2,646
- “H” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - The main island of the archipelago of Japan.
Corpus desk
Index EN-honshu · Honshu · English
Honshu · rank #63,685 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #63,685
- LEN-LONG 6 letters
- VOW-2 2 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 2,646
- PHOTO-FINISH hosanna
Nearest frequency peer: hosanna (+1 rank slots)
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.
Long-tail ranks near “Honshu”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- Hems
Hems
36,322 corpus weight
- her's
her's
36,320 corpus weight
- herringbone
herringbone
36,319 corpus weight
- Honshu
Honshu
36,316 corpus weight
- hosanna
hosanna
36,315 corpus weight
- hydrogenati…
hydrogenation
36,310 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “Honshu” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | Honshu |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Proper noun |
| IPA | /ˈhɑnʃu/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #63,685 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “Honshu” in English
Rare enough to double-check
Honshu is uncommon English at frequency #63,685 among 2,646 “H” headwords, classed as aproper noun, transcribed /ˈhɑnʃu/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "The main island of the archipelago of Japan.".
Honshu doesn't appear in our generated misspelling index, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. Our dataset records no confusable match here, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Japanese 本(ほん)州(しゅう) (Honshū, “main island”), from Middle Chinese 本 (pwón, “main”) + 州 (t͡ʃjuw, “province”). The correct English form is Honshu, spelled H-O-N-S-H-U.
Definition
- 1The main island of the archipelago of Japan.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how Honshu appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
A fascination with Hokkaido's wild country first drew the veterinarian to Abashiri, and he is a leading expert on the Ezo red fox. Like much of Hokkaido's wildlife, this fox is not found on Honshu.
In the past, the Ainu (their selfname meaning 'person'), traditionally huntergatherers, occupied not only Hokkaido but also a considerable part of the island of Honshu until the middle the eighteenth century, […]
Etymology
From Japanese 本(ほん)州(しゅう) (Honshū, “main island”), from Middle Chinese 本 (pwón, “main”) + 州 (t͡ʃjuw, “province”).
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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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "Honshu", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 6 letters (nearest by frequency rank).