skelly
/ˈskɛli/
"skelly" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“skelly” is uncommon English (frequency #64,715 among 6,566 “S” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #64,715
- frequency rank, English
- 6,566
- “S” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A squint.
Corpus desk
Index EN-skelly · skelly · English
skelly · rank #64,715 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #64,715
- LEN-LONG 6 letters
- VOW-2 2 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 6,566
- PHOTO-FINISH sisterly
Nearest frequency peer: sisterly (-1 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.
Long-tail ranks near “skelly”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- Sindhi
Sindhi
35,291 corpus weight
- sinew
sinew
35,290 corpus weight
- sisterly
sisterly
35,287 corpus weight
- skelly
skelly
35,286 corpus weight
- SKS
SKS
35,285 corpus weight
- soapstone
soapstone
35,281 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “skelly” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | skelly |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈskɛli/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #64,715 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “skelly” in English
Rare enough to double-check
skelly is uncommon English at frequency #64,715 among 6,566 “S” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed /ˈskɛli/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "A squint.".
We couldn't generate a plausible misspelling set for skelly, a sign its spelling follows regular English conventions. No close-neighbour confusable shows up for this headword in our dataset, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: Probably of North Germanic origin, from Old Norse *skjelga ("to squint"; found only in the reflexive skjelgask (“to come askew; squint the eyes”)), from Proto-Germanic *skilgijaną (“to squint”), from Proto-Germanic *skelhaz, *skelhwaz, *skelgaz (“slanted; s… The correct English form is skelly, spelled S-K-E-L-L-Y.
Definition
- 1A squint.
Etymology
Probably of North Germanic origin, from Old Norse *skjelga ("to squint"; found only in the reflexive skjelgask (“to come askew; squint the eyes”)), from Proto-Germanic *skilgijaną (“to squint”), from Proto-Germanic *skelhaz, *skelhwaz, *skelgaz (“slanted; sloping; squinting”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kel- (“to bend; crook”). Compare Danish skele (“to squint”), Swedish skela (“to squint”), Scots skellie, scalie, skellice (“to squint; look to the side”), German schielen (“to squint”).
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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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "skelly", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 6 letters (nearest by frequency rank).