lexeme
/ˈlɛkˌsiːm/
"lexeme" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“lexeme” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 6
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A lexical item corresponding to the set of all words (or of all multi-word expressions) that are semantically related through inflection of a particular shared basic form.
Corpus desk
Index EN-lexeme · lexeme · English
lexeme · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 6 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "L" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
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.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | lexeme |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈlɛkˌsiːm/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “lexeme” in English
Rare enough to double-check
lexeme is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun, transcribed /ˈlɛkˌsiːm/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 4 senses are on record.
No generated misspelling entries exist for lexeme in our index, a sign its spelling follows regular English conventions. This headword has no recorded confusable partner, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Latin lexis, from Ancient Greek λέξις (léxis, “word”) + -eme, a suffix indicating a fundamental unit in some aspect of linguistic structure, on the model of phoneme. The correct English form is lexeme, spelled L-E-X-E-M-E.
Definition
- 1A lexical item corresponding to the set of all words (or of all multi-word expressions) that are semantically related through inflection of a particular shared basic form.
- 2A lexical item corresponding to the set of all words (or of all multi-word expressions) that are semantically related through inflection of a particular shared basic form.
- 3A lexical item corresponding to the set of all words (or of all multi-word expressions) that are semantically related through inflection of a particular shared basic form.
- 4An individual instance of a continuous character sequence without spaces, used in lexical analysis.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how lexeme appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
A lexeme is a unit of lexical meaning, which exists regardless of any inflectional endings it may have or the number of words it may contain. Thus, fibrillate, rain cats and dogs, and come in are all lexemes, as are elephant, jog, cholesterol, happiness, put up with, face the music, and hundreds of thousands of other meaningful items in English.
In a typical lexicalist approach (e.g. Koontz-Garboden 2006), the unmarked lexeme is taken as lexically listed, even if its meaning (as it often does) includes templatic entailments, and the derivational morphology is taken to operate on the underived form to yield the derived form. This is the case not only morphologically, but also semantically.
Etymology
From Latin lexis, from Ancient Greek λέξις (léxis, “word”) + -eme, a suffix indicating a fundamental unit in some aspect of linguistic structure, on the model of phoneme.
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). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.