pendragon
/pɛnˈdɹæɡ(ə)n/
"pendragon" is a 9-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“pendragon” is uncommon English (frequency #56,969 among 46,516 “P” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #56,969
- frequency rank, English
- 46,516
- “P” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Also capitalized as Pendragon: a title assumed by the ancient British chiefs when called to lead other chiefs: chief war leader, chieftain, dictator, despot or king.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | pendragon |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /pɛnˈdɹæɡ(ə)n/ |
| Letters | 9 |
| Frequency rank | #56,969 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “pendragon” sits in English frequency
Rare enough to double-check
pendragon is uncommon English at frequency #56,969 among 46,516 “P” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed /pɛnˈdɹæɡ(ə)n/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Also capitalized as Pendragon: a title assumed by the ancient British chiefs when called to lead other chiefs: chief war leader, chieftain, dictator, despot or king.".
No misspelling variants are generated for pendragon in our index, typically a sign the spelling maps closely to how the word sounds. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, since no other headword is close enough in sound or shape to pair with it.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English Pendragon, borrowed from Welsh pendragon (“chief war leader”), from pen (“head; chief; principal, supreme”) (ultimately from Proto-Celtic *kʷennom (“head”)) + dragon (“dragon; commander, war leader”) (from Latin dracō (“serpent, snake; d… The correct English form is pendragon, spelled P-E-N-D-R-A-G-O-N.
Definition
- 1Also capitalized as Pendragon: a title assumed by the ancient British chiefs when called to lead other chiefs: chief war leader, chieftain, dictator, despot or king.
Etymology
From Middle English Pendragon, borrowed from Welsh pendragon (“chief war leader”), from pen (“head; chief; principal, supreme”) (ultimately from Proto-Celtic *kʷennom (“head”)) + dragon (“dragon; commander, war leader”) (from Latin dracō (“serpent, snake; dragon”), from Ancient Greek δρᾰ́κων (drắkōn, “serpent; dragon”), possibly from δέρκομαι (dérkomai, “to see, see clearly (in the sense of something staring)”), from Proto-Indo-European *derḱ- (“to see”)). Compare Late Latin īnsulāris dracō (literally “dragon of the island”), used by the monk Saint Gildas (c. 500 – c. 570 AD) in De Excidio et Conquestu Britanniae (On the Ruin and Conquest of Britain) as an epithet of Maelgwn Gwynedd (died c. 547), the king of Gwynedd.
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
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Using “pendragon”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is P-E-N-D-R-A-G-O-N - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /pɛnˈdɹæɡ(ə)n/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Other uncommon English words near this rank
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.