hox
"hox" is a 3-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“hox” is uncommon English (frequency #87,384 among 2,646 “H” headwords), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #87,384
- frequency rank, English
- 2,646
- “H” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - To hock; to hamstring; to cripple; to disable.
Corpus desk
Index EN-hox · hox · English
hox · rank #87,384 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #87,384
- LEN-MID 3 letters
- VOW-1 1 vowel
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 2,646
- PHOTO-FINISH Housley
Nearest frequency peer: Housley (-3 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 “hox”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- hoult
hoult
12,623 corpus weight
- houndstooth
houndstooth
12,622 corpus weight
- housebound
housebound
12,621 corpus weight
- Housley
Housley
12,620 corpus weight
- hox
hox
12,617 corpus weight
- hydrofluoric
hydrofluoric
12,612 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “hox” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | hox |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| Letters | 3 |
| Frequency rank | #87,384 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “hox” in English
Rare enough to double-check
hox is uncommon English at frequency #87,384 among 2,646 “H” headwords, classed as averb. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "To hock; to hamstring; to cripple; to disable.".
The misspelling generator found no plausible variants for hox, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. Our dataset records no confusable match here, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.
Etymologically, the entry records: Inherited from Middle English hoxen, reduction or back-formation of earlier hoxenen, from the noun *hoxene (only attested as hokschyne, with alteration after schyne), from Old English hōhsinu, from Proto-West Germanic *hą̄hasinu, from Proto-Germanic *hanhas… The correct English form is hox, spelled H-O-X.
Definition
- 1To hock; to hamstring; to cripple; to disable.
Recorded use
Wiktionary exampleThese source excerpts show how hox appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
To bide upon't: thou art not honest; or / If thou inclin'st that way, thou art a coward, / Which hoxes honesty behind, restraining / From course required.
Etymology
Inherited from Middle English hoxen, reduction or back-formation of earlier hoxenen, from the noun *hoxene (only attested as hokschyne, with alteration after schyne), from Old English hōhsinu, from Proto-West Germanic *hą̄hasinu, from Proto-Germanic *hanhasinwō, from *hanhaz (“heel”) + *senawō (“sinew”). Compare hough, huxen, and sinew.
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 "hox", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 3 letters (nearest by frequency rank).