philippic
/fɪˈlɪpɪk/
"philippic" is a 9-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“philippic” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 9
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Any of the discourses of Demosthenes against Philip II of Macedon, defending the liberty of Athens.
Corpus desk
Index EN-philippic · philippic · English
philippic · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 9 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "P" 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 | philippic |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /fɪˈlɪpɪk/ |
| Letters | 9 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “philippic” in English
Rare enough to double-check
philippic is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun, transcribed /fɪˈlɪpɪk/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
The misspelling generator found no plausible variants for philippic, typically a sign the spelling maps closely to how the word sounds. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Latin philippicus, from Ancient Greek φιλιππικός (philippikós), from Φίλιππος (Phílippos, “lover of horses”), from φίλος (phílos, “loving”) + ἵππος (híppos, “horse”). The correct English form is philippic, spelled P-H-I-L-I-P-P-I-C.
Definition
- 1Any of the discourses of Demosthenes against Philip II of Macedon, defending the liberty of Athens.
- 2Any tirade or declamation full of bitter condemnation.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how philippic appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
[…] the Bema, from whence Demosthenes thundered his philippics and fired the wavering patriotism of his countrymen.
Mrs. Ferrars looked exceedingly angry, and drawing herself up more stiffly than ever, pronounced in retort this bitter phillipic; “Miss Morton is Lord Morton’s daughter.”
Etymology
From Latin philippicus, from Ancient Greek φιλιππικός (philippikós), from Φίλιππος (Phílippos, “lover of horses”), from φίλος (phílos, “loving”) + ἵππος (híppos, “horse”).
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.