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roselle

/ɹoʊˈzɛl/noun

roselle is a noun meaning “Hibiscus sabdariffa, an edible flower in the hibiscus family used to make hibiscus tea” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled R-O-S-E-L-L-E and has 2 syllables, and it appears about once in every 7 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data, counting Roselle, the name). The plural of roselle is roselles.

What does roselle mean?

noun

  1. 1

    Hibiscus sabdariffa, an edible flower in the hibiscus family used to make hibiscus tea.

    I planted some roselle in the garden so I can start making my own hibiscus tea instead of relying on processed agua de jaimaica powders.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How do you pronounce roselle?

  • UK /ɹəʊˈzɛl/
  • US /ɹoʊˈzɛl/

Roselle has 2 syllables (counted from the pronunciation).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-roselle.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Forms of roselle

  • roselles plural
  • rosella

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How common is roselle?

Roselle appears about once in every 7 million words in written English, the 76,798th most frequent word form in the list. The list counts every capitalisation together, so this includes Roselle, the name.

Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

Roselle in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

In the sense Hibiscus sabdariffa:

LanguageWords
Frenchoseille de Guinée
GermanHibiskus, Roselle, Afrikanische Malve
Portuguesevinagreira, rosela, azedinha, caruru-azedo, baguiche
Spanishjamaica

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.

Where does roselle come from?

Uncertain. Perhaps an alteration or misapprehension of French oseille denoting this plant, specific use of oseille sorrel; perhaps compare also sorrel.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).