mortifying

noun

"mortifying" is a 10-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.

The verdict

“mortifying” is uncommon English (frequency #56,296 among 4,057 “M” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

#56,296
frequency rank, English
4,057
“M” headwords

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - mortification; abstinence

Corpus desk

Index EN-mortifying · mortifying · English

mortifying · rank #56,296 · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-RARE #56,296
  • LEN-MEGA 10 letters
  • VOW-4 4 vowels
  • CONFUS-0 No pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-MID 4,057
  • PHOTO-FINISH morgenstern

Nearest frequency peer: morgenstern (-1 rank slots)

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.

Long-tail ranks near “mortifying”

Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter

corpus weight

What this shows Long-tail view: where “mortifying” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026
Key facts for mortifying
PropertyValue
Headwordmortifying
LanguageEnglish
Part of speechNoun
Letters10
Frequency rank#56,296
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Long-tail rank of “mortifying” in English

Word frequency stretches from the small set of words we reach for constantly (left) out to the long tail barely used once in a while (right).mortifyingfalls in this rarity band:

#1#100#1K#10K#100K
← used constantlyrarely used →

The axis is logarithmic, with each marked tick roughly ten times rarer than the last. Rare peers in the same band: “morgenstern” (#56,295), “Moen” (#56,294), “motorcycling” (#56,299). Among 4,057 “M” headwords, “mortifying” is #56,296. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

mortifying is uncommon English at frequency #56,296 among 4,057 “M” headwords, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "mortification; abstinence".

No generated misspelling entries exist for mortifying in our index, a straightforward case of a spelling with little room for common typos. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.

No borrowing history is documented for this entry, so any spelling logic here comes from how the word's sounds map to letters, not a documented origin story. The correct English form is mortifying, spelled M-O-R-T-I-F-Y-I-N-G.

Definition

  1. 1
    mortification; abstinence

Recorded use

Wiktionary example

These source excerpts show how mortifying appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.

  1. mortifyings of the flesh

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

How do you spell "mortifying"?
"mortifying" is spelled M-O-R-T-I-F-Y-I-N-G.
What does "mortifying" mean?
As a noun, "mortifying" means: mortification; abstinence
What language does "mortifying" come from?
"mortifying" is a English word. PlainSpell's reference spans five languages -- English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German -- with definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for each.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Similar English words by spelling shape

Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "mortifying", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked English headwords with 10 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list