sacrum
/ˈsækɹəm/
"sacrum" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“sacrum” is an uncommon English word, ranked #63,219 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #63,219
- frequency rank, English
- 6
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A large triangular bone at the base of the spine, located between the two ilia (wings of the pelvis) and formed from vertebrae that fuse in adulthood.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | sacrum |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈsækɹəm/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #63,219 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “sacrum” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for sacrum is 6 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈsækɹəm/. Corpus data places it at rank #63,219 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "A large triangular bone at the base of the spine, located between the two ilia (wings of the pelvis) and formed from vertebrae that fuse in adulthood.".
Zero misspellings are on record for sacrum in our index, since its letter sequence doesn't invite the usual edit-distance slips. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, a sign it's visually distinctive enough not to be mixed up with another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Latin os sacrum (“holy bone”), a calque of Ancient Greek ἱερὸν ὀστέον (hieròn ostéon). Apparently so called either because the sacrum was the part of the animal offered in sacrifice or because of a putative belief that it is where a person's soul resid… The correct English form is sacrum, spelled S-A-C-R-U-M.
Definition
- 1A large triangular bone at the base of the spine, located between the two ilia (wings of the pelvis) and formed from vertebrae that fuse in adulthood.
Etymology
From Latin os sacrum (“holy bone”), a calque of Ancient Greek ἱερὸν ὀστέον (hieròn ostéon). Apparently so called either because the sacrum was the part of the animal offered in sacrifice or because of a putative belief that it is where a person's soul resides. A third explanation is that the term is a translation of Ancient Greek ἱερόν (hierón), which has two meanings: “holy, sacred”, and “big” — big being a more appropriate description of the sacrum — but compare.
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); 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 “sacrum”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is S-A-C-R-U-M - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈsækɹəm/ (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
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.