sleep with one's fathers

verb

"sleep-with-one-s-fathers" is a 20-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.

The verdict

“sleep with one's fathers” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

Unranked
below top-frequency English
24
letters

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - To be buried together with one's forebears; hence, to die; also, to be dead.

Corpus desk

Index EN-sleep-with-one-s-fathers · sleep with one's fathers · English

sleep with one's fathers · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
  • LEN-MEGA 24 letters
  • VOW-7 7 vowels
  • CONFUS-0 No pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-THIN "S" 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.

Key facts for sleep with one's fathers
PropertyValue
Headwordsleep with one's fathers
LanguageEnglish
Part of speechVerb
Letters24
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Long-tail rank of “sleep with one's fathers” in English

sleep with one's fathersfalls outside the top-100,000 ranked English words, the long-tail zone of technical, archaic, or low-frequency vocabulary, exactly where readers second-guess spellings most.

Beyond rank #100,000. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

sleep with one's fathers is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as averb. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "To be buried together with one's forebears; hence, to die; also, to be dead.".

sleep with one's fathers doesn't appear in our generated misspelling index, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, a sign it's visually distinctive enough not to be mixed up with another word.

Etymologically, the entry records: Calque of Biblical Hebrew וַיִּשְׁכַּב עִם־אֲבֹתָיו (wayyiškaḇ ʿim-ʾăḇōṯâw, literally “he slept with his fathers”) (found, for example, in the Bible at 1 Kings 2:10); compare be gathered to one's fathers. The correct English form is sleep with one's fathers, spelled S-L-E-E-P- -W-I-T-H- -O-N-E-'-S- -F-A-T-H-E-R-S.

Definition

  1. 1
    To be buried together with one's forebears; hence, to die; also, to be dead.

Etymology

Calque of Biblical Hebrew וַיִּשְׁכַּב עִם־אֲבֹתָיו (wayyiškaḇ ʿim-ʾăḇōṯâw, literally “he slept with his fathers”) (found, for example, in the Bible at 1 Kings 2:10); compare be gathered to one's fathers.

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.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "sleep with one's fathers"?
"sleep with one's fathers" is spelled S-L-E-E-P- -W-I-T-H- -O-N-E-'-S- -F-A-T-H-E-R-S.
What does "sleep with one's fathers" mean?
As a verb, "sleep with one's fathers" means: To be buried together with one's forebears; hence, to die; also, to be dead.
What is the origin of the word "sleep with one's fathers"?
Calque of Biblical Hebrew וַיִּשְׁכַּב עִם־אֲבֹתָיו (wayyiškaḇ ʿim-ʾăḇōṯâw, literally “he slept with his fathers”) (found, for example, in the Bible at 1 Kings 2:10); compare be gathered to one's fathers. See the full etymology section above for more details.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list