Thelma
"thelma" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“Thelma” has 9 generated spelling variants in the English index at frequency #28,400. The variants make it a useful spelling check.
- #28,400
- frequency rank, English
- 3,151
- “T” headwords
- 9
- tracked misspellings
- 5
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A female given name originating as a coinage.
Corpus desk
Index EN-thelma · Thelma · English
Thelma · rank #28,400 · 9 variants · 5 confusables
- FREQ-MID #28,400
- LEN-LONG 6 letters
- VOW-2 2 vowels
- CONFUS-MID 5 pairs
- VAR-MID 9 variants
- BOOK-MID 3,151
- PHOTO-FINISH tenuous
Nearest frequency peer: tenuous (-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.
Rank peers near misspelling magnet “Thelma”
Same rarity band: useful when a typo lands on a peer headword
- synaptic
synaptic
71,604 corpus weight
- tailgate
tailgate
71,603 corpus weight
- tenuous
tenuous
71,602 corpus weight
- Thelma
Thelma
71,601 corpus weight
- threes
threes
71,600 corpus weight
- Tobin
Tobin
71,599 corpus weight
What this shows “Thelma” 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 | Thelma |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Proper noun |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #28,400 |
| Misspellings tracked | 9 |
| Confusable pairs | 5 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency seat of misspelling magnet “Thelma”
A misspelling magnet
The generator records 9 spelling variants around Thelma, aproper noun. Corpus frequency is #28,400 among 3,151 “T” headwords. Dominant gloss: "A female given name originating as a coinage.".
Our generated misspelling index lists 9 likely wrong-spelling variants for Thelma, with forms such as "htelma", "tehlma", and "thelam". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 5 confusable-pair relationships, "them", "theme", "theta", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: A literary invention, first appeared in the Swedish novel Kyrkoinvigningen i Hammarby (1840-1841) by Emilie Flygare-Carlén, translated into English as "The Magic Goblet" (1845). Similar names of ambiguous origin, Elma, Selma, Velma, appeared in the 19th cen… The correct English form is Thelma, spelled T-H-E-L-M-A.
Definition
- 1A female given name originating as a coinage.
Recorded use
Wiktionary exampleThese source excerpts show how Thelma appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
"Just the sort of name to suit a Norwegian nymph or goddess. Thelma is quaint and appropriate, and as far as I can remember there's no rhyme to it in the English language. Thelma!"
Etymology
A literary invention, first appeared in the Swedish novel Kyrkoinvigningen i Hammarby (1840-1841) by Emilie Flygare-Carlén, translated into English as "The Magic Goblet" (1845). Similar names of ambiguous origin, Elma, Selma, Velma, appeared in the 19th century. By folk etymology explained as Ancient Greek θέλημα (thélēma, “will”). Notice also the Spanish and Portuguese Telma, a rare feminine form of Telmo, ultimately from Santelmo or Saint Elmo.
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as:
- htelma
- tehlma
- thelam
- thellma
- thelmma
- themla
- thhelma
- thlema
- tthelma
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of Thelma - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
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 "Thelma", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 6 letters (nearest by frequency rank).
Similar misspelling depth
Headwords with a similar count of attested misspellings (9 here; floor ≥5).