swallow
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
7 characters
Language
English
word origin
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "swallow", 7-letters, with pronunciation in International Phonetic Alphabet notation, etymology traced through Germanic and Romance roots where applicable, common misspelling variants catalogued from Hunspell error dictionaries, and usage frequency ranked against the top 100,000 English words in the Wordfreq corpus. PlainSpell covers English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German spelling with confusable-pair detection that highlights visually and phonetically similar words. This entry for "swallow" includes synonyms, antonyms, homophones, and cross-language translation pointers sourced from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org extract. Whether you are verifying the correct spelling of "swallow" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
swallow is aEnglishverb. It means: To cause (food, drink etc.) to pass from the mouth into the stomach; to take into the stomach through the throat. Pronounced /ˈswɒl.əʊ/. It ranks #8,731 in English word frequency. Often confused with swallowed and shallow.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | swallow |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /ˈswɒl.əʊ/ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #8,731 |
| Misspellings tracked | 9 |
| Confusable pairs | 4 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for swallow is 7 letters long, classified as averb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈswɒl.əʊ/. Corpus data places it at rank #8,731 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 7 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 9 documented wrong-spelling variants for swallow, with forms such as "sawllow", "sswallow", and "swalloww". Each variant represents a distinct typo pattern that appears often enough in corpora to be worth flagging, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution.It also participates in 4 confusable-pair relationships, "swallowed", "shallow", "scallop", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English swolwen, from Old English swelgan, from Proto-West Germanic *swelgan, from Proto-Germanic *swelganą (“to swallow, revel, devour”), from Proto-Indo-European *swelk- (“to gulp”). Cognate with Dutch zwelgen (“to revel, carouse, guzzle”), Ge… Root origin matters for spelling because borrowed morphemes (Greek, Latin, Old French, Old English) carry their source-language orthographic conventions into modern English, which is why historical etymology is often the cleanest predictor of whether a cluster like "-ough", "-eau", or "-tion" will appear. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct English form is swallow, spelled S-W-A-L-L-O-W, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1To cause (food, drink etc.) to pass from the mouth into the stomach; to take into the stomach through the throat.
- 2To take (something) in so that it disappears; to consume, absorb.
- 3To take food down into the stomach; to make the muscular contractions of the oesophagus to achieve this, often taken as a sign of nervousness or strong emotion.
- 4To accept easily or without questions; to believe, accept.
- 5To engross; to appropriate; usually with up.
- 6To retract; to recant.
- 7To put up with; to bear patiently or without retaliation.
Etymology
From Middle English swolwen, from Old English swelgan, from Proto-West Germanic *swelgan, from Proto-Germanic *swelganą (“to swallow, revel, devour”), from Proto-Indo-European *swelk- (“to gulp”). Cognate with Dutch zwelgen (“to revel, carouse, guzzle”), German schwelgen (“to delight, indulge”), Swedish svälja (“to swallow, gulp”), Icelandic svelgja (“to swallow”), Old English swillan, swilian (“to swill, wash out, gargle”). See also swill. The noun is from Middle English swolow, swolwe, from Old English swelh, swelg (“gulf, chasm”) and ġeswelge (“gulf, chasm, abyss, whirlpool”), both from Proto-West Germanic *swelg, *swalgi, from Proto-Germanic *swelgaz, *swalgiz. Cognate with Old English swiliġe (“pit”), Scots swelch, swellie, swallie (“an abyss in the sea, whirpool”), Middle Low German swelch (“whirlpool, eddy”), Dutch zwelg (“gorge, chasm, gullet, throat”), Old Norse svelgr (“whirlpool, current, stream”).
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: sawllow,sswallow,swalloww,swallwo,swalolw,swalow,swlalow,swwallow,wsallow
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for swallow
Misspelling Variants of "swallow"
Frequency rank: #8,731 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter S in our English index: