sheldrake
"sheldrake" is a 9-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“sheldrake” is uncommon English (frequency #86,746 among 6,566 “S” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #86,746
- frequency rank, English
- 6,566
- “S” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 2, 2026) - An Old World duck of the genus Tadorna (shelducks).
Corpus desk
Index EN-sheldrake · sheldrake · English
sheldrake · rank #86,746 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #86,746
- LEN-LONG 9 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 6,566
- PHOTO-FINISH Shazia
Nearest frequency peer: Shazia (-2 rank slots)
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.
Frequency neighbourhood for “sheldrake”
Lower corpus rank = more everyday usage (inverted bar length for readability)
- shawty
shawty
13,258 corpus weight
- Shazia
Shazia
13,257 corpus weight
- sheldrake
sheldrake
13,255 corpus weight
- shrivelled
shrivelled
13,250 corpus weight
- Sibi
Sibi
13,249 corpus weight
- Siddique
Siddique
13,248 corpus weight
What this shows Bars show where “sheldrake” sits against the nearest ranked English headwords in the FrequencyWords band, not a reprint of letter-browse containment.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | sheldrake |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 9 |
| Frequency rank | #86,746 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “sheldrake” sits in English frequency
Rare enough to double-check
sheldrake is uncommon English at frequency #86,746 among 6,566 “S” headwords, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 4 senses are on record.
Zero misspellings are on record for sheldrake in our index, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. Our dataset records no confusable match here, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English sheld- (“parti-colored”) (akin to Middle Dutch shillede) + drake (“male duck”). The correct English form is sheldrake, spelled S-H-E-L-D-R-A-K-E.
Definition
- 1An Old World duck of the genus Tadorna (shelducks).
- 2An Old World duck of the genus Tadorna (shelducks).
- 3A merganser.
- 4The call sign for an artillery officer.
Etymology
From Middle English sheld- (“parti-colored”) (akin to Middle Dutch shillede) + drake (“male duck”).
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.
PlainSpell is rendered directly from structured Wiktionary extracts and open word-frequency lists, no number is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of September 2, 2026. Primary sources: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) and FrequencyWords.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "sheldrake", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 9 letters (nearest by frequency rank).
What to do next
You've looked up "sheldrake". Here's where to go from here.
- Usage frequency rank #86,746 among English headwords in this corpus. Corpus statistics
- Browse more English words in the "S" letter cohort. S–Z browse
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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.