motley fool
"motley-fool" is a 10-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“motley fool” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 11
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A court jester; a jester.
Corpus desk
Index EN-motley-fool · motley fool · English
motley fool · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 11 letters
- VOW-5 5 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "M" 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 | motley fool |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 11 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “motley fool” in English
Rare enough to double-check
motley fool is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "A court jester; a jester.".
Zero misspellings are on record for motley fool in our index, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
Etymologically, the entry records: From motley (“multi-colored cloth; a jester's clothes”) + fool (“a jester”). The correct English form is motley fool, spelled M-O-T-L-E-Y- -F-O-O-L.
Definition
- 1A court jester; a jester.
Recorded use
Wiktionary exampleThese source excerpts show how motley fool appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
A fool, a fool! I met a fool i’ th’ forest, / A motley fool. A miserable world!
Etymology
From motley (“multi-colored cloth; a jester's clothes”) + fool (“a jester”).
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.