swain
/sweɪn/
"swain" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“swain” has 7 generated spelling variants in the English index at frequency #29,112. The variants make it a useful spelling check.
- #29,112
- frequency rank, English
- 6,566
- “S” headwords
- 7
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A young man or boy in service; a servant.
Corpus desk
Index EN-swain · swain · English
swain · rank #29,112 · 7 variants · 20 confusables
- FREQ-MID #29,112
- LEN-MID 5 letters
- VOW-2 2 vowels
- CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
- VAR-MID 7 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 6,566
- PHOTO-FINISH surged
Nearest frequency peer: surged (-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.
Rank peers near misspelling magnet “swain”
Same rarity band: useful when a typo lands on a peer headword
- supercar
supercar
70,893 corpus weight
- superfluous
superfluous
70,892 corpus weight
- surged
surged
70,891 corpus weight
- swain
swain
70,889 corpus weight
- SXSW
SXSW
70,887 corpus weight
- synchronous
synchronous
70,886 corpus weight
What this shows “swain” sits among these FrequencyWords peers; misspelling depth is tracked separately in the edit-distance chart.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | swain |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /sweɪn/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #29,112 |
| Misspellings tracked | 7 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency seat of misspelling magnet “swain”
A misspelling magnet
The generator records 7 spelling variants around swain (IPA /sweɪn/), anoun. Corpus frequency is #29,112 among 6,566 “S” headwords. Wiktionary lists 4 senses, so context still picks the gloss.
Our generated misspelling index lists 7 likely wrong-spelling variants for swain, with forms such as "sawin", "sswain", and "swainn". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "swim", "swap", "swan", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English swayn, swain, sweyn, swein, from Old English sweġen (attested also as personal name Swein, Sweġen), from Old Norse sveinn, from Proto-Germanic *swainaz (“relative, young man, servant”), from Proto-Indo-European *swé (“oneself; separate; … The correct English form is swain, spelled S-W-A-I-N.
Definition
- 1A young man or boy in service; a servant.
- 2A knight's servant; an attendant.
- 3A country labourer; a countryman, a rustic.
- 4A rural lover; a male sweetheart in a pastoral setting.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how swain appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
theſe that ſeeme but ſilly country Swaines, May haue the leading of so great an hoſte, As with their waight ſhal make the mountains quake.
Why thus from the Plain does my Shepherdess rove Forsaking Her Swain and neglecting his love?
Etymology
From Middle English swayn, swain, sweyn, swein, from Old English sweġen (attested also as personal name Swein, Sweġen), from Old Norse sveinn, from Proto-Germanic *swainaz (“relative, young man, servant”), from Proto-Indo-European *swé (“oneself; separate; apart”), thus properly one's own. Cognate with Danish svend (“hireling, young man”), Norwegian svein (“lad, young man, servant”) Icelandic sveinn (“boy, lad, servant”), Swedish sven (“swain, servant”), Low German Sween, dialectal German Schwein, Old English swān (“swineherd, lad”).
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as:
- sawin
- sswain
- swainn
- swani
- swian
- swwain
- wsain
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of swain - expressed in single-character edits (insert, delete, or swap one letter). Bigger bars stand out at a glance; a one-edit slip is the hardest to catch.
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 "swain", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 5 letters (nearest by frequency rank).
Similar misspelling depth
Headwords with a similar count of attested misspellings (7 here; floor ≥5).