overweening
/əʊvəˈwiːnɪŋ/
"overweening" is a 11-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“overweening” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as an adjective. 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) - Unduly confident; (sometimes also) arrogant.
Corpus desk
Index EN-overweening · overweening · English
overweening · 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 "O" 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 | overweening |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /əʊvəˈwiːnɪŋ/ |
| Letters | 11 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “overweening” in English
Rare enough to double-check
overweening is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anadjective, transcribed /əʊvəˈwiːnɪŋ/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
We couldn't generate a plausible misspelling set for overweening, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. No confusable counterpart is on file for this word, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English overweninge, equivalent to overween + -ing. Cognate with obsolete Dutch overwanig, overwaand (“presumptuous; cocky; conceited”). The correct English form is overweening, spelled O-V-E-R-W-E-E-N-I-N-G.
Definition
- 1Unduly confident; (sometimes also) arrogant.
- 2Exaggerated, excessive.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how overweening appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
She wins one modeling contest in Montana and suddenly she’s overweening.
Heere's an ouer-weening rogue.
Etymology
From Middle English overweninge, equivalent to overween + -ing. Cognate with obsolete Dutch overwanig, overwaand (“presumptuous; cocky; conceited”).
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.