sweal
/swiːl/
"sweal" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“sweal” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 5
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - To burn slowly.
Corpus desk
Index EN-sweal · sweal · English
sweal · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MID 5 letters
- VOW-2 2 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.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | sweal |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /swiːl/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “sweal” in English
Rare enough to double-check
sweal is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as averb, transcribed /swiːl/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 5 senses are on record.
No misspelling variants are generated for sweal in our index, since its letter sequence doesn't invite the usual edit-distance slips. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English swelen, from Old English swelan (“to burn, be burnt up, inflame”) (compare Old English swǣlan (“to burn”)), from Proto-West Germanic *swelan, from Proto-Germanic *swelaną (“to smoulder, burn slowly, create a burningly cold sensation”), f… The correct English form is sweal, spelled S-W-E-A-L.
Definition
- 1To burn slowly.
- 2To melt and run down, as the tallow of a candle; waste away without feeding the flame.
- 3To singe; scorch; dress (as a hog) with burning or singeing.
- 4To consume with fire; burn.
- 5To make disappear; cause to waste away; diminish; reduce.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how sweal appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
[M]ind ye dinna let the candle sweal as ye gang alang the wainscot parlour, and haud a' the house scouring to get out the grease again.
"He thinks it's only a tumour!" cried Annie to her mother. "And he can sweal it away."
Etymology
From Middle English swelen, from Old English swelan (“to burn, be burnt up, inflame”) (compare Old English swǣlan (“to burn”)), from Proto-West Germanic *swelan, from Proto-Germanic *swelaną (“to smoulder, burn slowly, create a burningly cold sensation”), from Proto-Indo-European *swel- (“to shine, warm, smoulder, burn”). Cognate with Dutch zwelen (“to smoulder”), Low German swelen (“to smoulder”), German schwelen (“to smoulder”), Icelandic svala (“to cool”). Related to swelter.
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.