lecherous
/ˈlɛtʃ.ə.ɹəs/
"lecherous" is a 9-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“lecherous” is an uncommon English word, ranked #63,758 in English word frequency and used as an adjective.
- #63,758
- frequency rank, English
- 9
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Given to excessive sexual activity and debauchery.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | lecherous |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /ˈlɛtʃ.ə.ɹəs/ |
| Letters | 9 |
| Frequency rank | #63,758 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “lecherous” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for lecherous is 9 letters long, classified as an adjective, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈlɛtʃ.ə.ɹəs/. Corpus data places it at rank #63,758 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "Given to excessive sexual activity and debauchery.".
No generated misspelling entries exist for lecherous in our index, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. No close-neighbour confusable shows up for this headword in our dataset, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English lecherous, licherous, from Old French *lecherous (attested in Old French lecherousement (“lecherously”)), from Old French lecherie, licherie (“gluttony, sensuality, lewdness, lechery”), from Old French lecher, lechier, lekier, lescher (“… The correct English form is lecherous, spelled L-E-C-H-E-R-O-U-S.
Definition
- 1Given to excessive sexual activity and debauchery.
Etymology
From Middle English lecherous, licherous, from Old French *lecherous (attested in Old French lecherousement (“lecherously”)), from Old French lecherie, licherie (“gluttony, sensuality, lewdness, lechery”), from Old French lecher, lechier, lekier, lescher (“to lick, live in gluttony or sensuality”), from Old Frankish *lekkōn, *likkōn (“to lick”), from Proto-Germanic *likkōną (“to lick”), from Proto-Indo-European *leyǵʰ- (“to lick”), equivalent to lecher + -ous. More at lick.
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 “lecherous”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is L-E-C-H-E-R-O-U-S - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈlɛtʃ.ə.ɹəs/ (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.