polysemy
/ˈpɒ.lɪ.siː.mi/
"polysemy" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“polysemy” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 8
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - The quality characteristic of a polyseme, a sign (such as a word or symbol) that has multiple meanings (senses), often including multiple similar ones.
Corpus desk
Index EN-polysemy · polysemy · English
polysemy · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 8 letters
- VOW-4 4 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 | polysemy |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈpɒ.lɪ.siː.mi/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “polysemy” in English
Rare enough to double-check
polysemy is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun, transcribed /ˈpɒ.lɪ.siː.mi/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "The quality characteristic of a polyseme, a sign (such as a word or symbol) that has multiple meanings (senses), often including multiple similar ones.".
polysemy has no tracked misspelling variants, a sign its spelling follows regular English conventions. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, suggesting its spelling stands apart enough that readers rarely confuse it with something else.
Etymologically, the entry records: From polyseme + -y. The correct English form is polysemy, spelled P-O-L-Y-S-E-M-Y.
Definition
- 1The quality characteristic of a polyseme, a sign (such as a word or symbol) that has multiple meanings (senses), often including multiple similar ones.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how polysemy appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Fifty years ago the linguist and semanticist Stephen Ullmann wrote that polysemy, the fact that some words have a network of multiple but related meanings, is "the pivot of semantic analysis" […]
Polysemy proliferates in natural language: Virtually every word is polysemous to some extent.
Etymology
From polyseme + -y.
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.