martlet
/ˈmɑɹt.lət/noun
martlet is a noun meaning “A depiction of a bird similar to a house martin or swallow with stylized feet” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled M-A-R-T-L-E-T and has 2 syllables, and it appears about once in every 56 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of martlet is martlets.
What does martlet mean?
noun
- 1
obsoleteA bird, the martin.
- 2
A depiction of a bird similar to a house martin or swallow with stylized feet.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce martlet?
- UK /ˈmɑːt.lət/
- US /ˈmɑɹt.lət/
Martlet has 2 syllables (counted from the pronunciation).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Forms of martlet
- martlets plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is martlet?
Martlet appears about once in every 56 million words in written English, the 234,209th 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).
Martlet in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense depiction of a mythological bird:
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 martlet come from?
From Middle English martilet, probably a blend of martinet (“martin”; from Middle French martinet and Medieval Latin martineta) and Middle French merlet.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).