internecine
/ˌɪntɚˈnɛsin/adjective
internecine is spelled I-N-T-E-R-N-E-C-I-N-E: 11 letters and 4 syllables. It appears about once in every 5 million words in written English, the 68,248th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As an adjective, internecine means “Mutually destructive; most often applied to warfare” (English Wiktionary, September 2026).
How many letters and syllables are in internecine?
| Letters | 11: I-N-T-E-R-N-E-C-I-N-E |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 4 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | about once in every 5 million words; the 68,248th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How common is internecine?
Internecine appears about once in every 5 million words in written English, the 68,248th 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).
How do you pronounce internecine?
- UK /ˌɪntəˈniːsaɪn/
- UK /-sɪn/
- US /ˌɪntɚˈnɛsin/
Internecine has 4 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-internecine.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
What does internecine mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
adjective
- 1
Mutually destructive; most often applied to warfare.
Internecine strife in Gaza claimed its most senior victim yesterday when militants assassinated one of the most hated security chiefs there.
- 2
Characterized by struggle within a group, usually applied to an ethnic or familial relationship.
The Mongol people were plagued by internecine conflict until Genghis Khan unified them by focusing their aggression outwards on other peoples.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Internecine in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
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 internecine come from?
Borrowed from Latin internecīnus (“deadly”), from internecium (“a massacre, bloodbath; an eradication”) + -īnus. In Latin, the sememe 'between' was here not expressed by the prefix, it instead either had a somewhat emphatic meaning or meant "down, under", comparable to its use in other Latin terms related to death: see interficiō and intereō. The English current sense is thus a reanalysis of the Latin through English inter-.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).