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PlainSpell

lamb

/ˈlæm/noun, verb

lamb is spelled L-A-M-B: 4 letters and one syllable. It appears 10 times per million words in written English, the 6,884th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, lamb means “A young sheep; especially, one younger than nine months” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of lamb is lambs or lambren; Wiktionary also lists lamber (dialectal).

How many letters and syllables are in lamb?

Letters4: L-A-M-B
Syllables1
In writing10 times per million words; the 6,884th most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searchednone measured in search
Rhymes with
Same letters

Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.

How common is lamb?

Lamb appears 10 times per million words in written English, the 6,884th 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 lamb?

  • UK /ˈlæm/
  • British /ˈlam/
  • US /ˈlæm/

Lamb has one syllable.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-lamb.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

What rhymes with lamb?

10 words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as lamb from its last stressed vowel (/æm/):

Spelled with the same letters in another order: balm, blam.

Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).

Forms of lamb

  • lambs plural, present, singular, he/she/it
  • lambren plural
  • lambing participle, present
  • lambed participle, past

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What does lamb mean?

The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).

noun

  1. 1

    A young sheep; especially, one younger than nine months.

    Mary had a little lamb, its fleece as white as snow.

  2. 2

    obsoleteA young goat; a kid.

    The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], 1611, →OCLC, Exodus 12:5: “Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male of the first year: ye shall take it out from the sheep, or from the goats:”

  3. 3

    The flesh of a lamb used as food; (sometimes loosely) the flesh of a sheep of any age used as food.

  4. 4

    A person who is meek, docile, and easily led.

    Near-synonym: sheep

  5. 5

    Lambskin.

  6. 6

    A simple, unsophisticated person.

  7. 7

    slangOne who ignorantly speculates on the stock exchange and is victimized.

  8. 8

    slangA fan of American singer, songwriter, actress, and record producer Mariah Carey (born 1969).

verb

  1. 1

    Of a sheep, to give birth.

  2. 2

    To assist (sheep) to give birth.

    The shepherd was up all night, lambing her young ewes.

noun

as Lamb
  1. 1

    slangAlternative letter-case form of lamb (“a fan of Mariah Carey”).

noun

as LAMB
  1. 1

    Acronym of lentigines, atrial myxomas, mucocutaneous myxomas, and blue naevi.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

Lamb in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchagneau, agnelle (young sheep), mettre bas (of a sheep, to give birth)
GermanLamm (young sheep), Lammfleisch (flesh of lamb as food)
Portugueseanho, cordeiro (young sheep)
Spanishcordero (young sheep), carne de cordero (flesh of lamb as food), borrego, borrega (meek person)

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 lamb come from?

From Middle English lamb, from Old English lamb, from Proto-West Germanic *lamb, from Proto-Germanic *lambaz, probably from Proto-Indo-European *h₁l̥h₁onbʰos, enlargement of *h₁elh₁én, ultimately from *h₁el-. See also Dutch lam, German Lamm, Bavarian Lamperl, Danish lam, Swedish lamm, Finnish lammas, Scottish Gaelic lon (“elk”), Ancient Greek ἔλαφος (élaphos, “red deer”). More at elk.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What to look up after lamb